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Min Ko Naing
Paw Oo Tun (Burmese: ပေါ်ဦးထွန်း [pɔ̀ ʔú tʰʊ́ɰ̃]; born 18 October 1962), better known by his alias Min Ko Naing (မင်းကိုနိုင် [mɪ́ɰ̃ kò nàɪɰ̃], lit. "conqueror of kings"), is a leading democracy activist and dissident from Myanmar. He has spent most of the years since 1988 imprisoned by the state for his opposition activities. The New York Times has described him as Burma's "most influential opposition figure after Daw Aung San Suu Kyi".
Min Ko Naing was born in Yangon, the third son of Thet Nyunt and Hla Kyi, a couple from Mudon in Mon State. He has three sisters: Kyi Kyi Nyunt, Ye Ye Nyunt, and Thadar Nyunt. His parents are of ethnic Mon people but Min Ko Naing has only a smattering of Mon language. He has remained involved in the Yangon's Mon community, serving a speaker on the annual Mon National Day.
Min Ko Naing began his undergrad study at the Rangoon Arts and Science University in the mid-1980s where he majored in Zoology. During his student years, he was an active member of the arts club, where he enjoyed reading, writing poems and drawing cartoons, especially satirical ones. According to classmates, Min Ko Naing was a member of a performance troupe that took part in the traditional Than Gyat competition during Thingyan (Burma's annual Water Festival) in April. Taking the name "Goat-Mouth and Spirit-Eye", the troupe performed satirical plays and sketches satirizing Burma's military government and the lack of freedom and democracy. Though the troupe was popular, it also attracted the attention of Burmese Military Intelligence agents, who began to track Min Ko Naing's movements. Despite the illegality of forming student unions in Burma, Min Ko Naing and other students formed clandestine study groups to discuss Burma's political situation, which grew into a secret student union.
In September 1987, Ne Win voided most denominations of the kyat without warning, causing many people to lose their savings overnight. Students who saved money for tuition fees were particularly affected. The announcement led to riots at several universities. The situation was further exacerbated by the shooting of protesting student Phone Maw in a 12 March 1988 clash with police. On 16 March, Min Ko Naing organized a rally of 3,000 students on the RASU campus in which he spoke about the role of student movements in Burmese history. When the students attempted to march to the Rangoon Institute of Technology, where Phone Maw had been killed, they encountered a barbed wire barricade at Inya Lake and were attacked by riot police, resulting in several deaths and many arrests.
Shortly after this, Ne Win's government closed the universities, and the movement went underground. Min Ko Naing continued to organize protesters and circulate posters of the violence at Inya Lake. Ne Win soon agreed to step down from office, and on 7 July, many imprisoned student activists were released. The following day, Min Ko Naing and others released the first statement in the name of the new All Burma Federation of Student Unions (ABFSU), an organization that had previously been known for its struggle against British colonial rule: "We shouldn't be swayed by the release of our fellow students. We will continue to fight."The ABSFU continued to release statements by Min Ko Naing urging protests to the military government, including one calling for a general strike on 8-8-88, a number that would later become synonymous with the movement itself.
The 8-8-88 general strike drew hundreds of thousands of people to the streets of Yangon, and is widely seen as a turning point in the Burmese democracy movement. Min Ko Naing continued to speak to crowds in front of the US Embassy and Rangoon General Hospital, the sites of previous killings of protesters by Burmese government forces. He also arranged for the daughter of independence hero Aung San, Aung San Suu Kyi, to make her first speech to a crowd at Shwedagon Pagoda. Aung San Suu Kyi would go on to be elected prime minister in the 1990 general election, only to be denied office and imprisoned by the State Law and Order Restoration Council, the new military government.
The protests lasted until 18 September, at which point soldiers opened fire on the crowds, resulting in at least 3,000 deaths.
Forced to go underground, Min Ko Naing continued his organizing work while moving from house to house every night to avoid arrest. After several months, he was captured along with other students. He was sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment, under Section 5(j) of the 1950 Emergency Provisions Act for instigating "disturbances to the detriment of law and order, peace and tranquility". His sentence was commuted to 10 years under a general amnesty in January 1993. He was considered a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International, which intensively campaigned for his release.
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Min Ko Naing
Paw Oo Tun (Burmese: ပေါ်ဦးထွန်း [pɔ̀ ʔú tʰʊ́ɰ̃]; born 18 October 1962), better known by his alias Min Ko Naing (မင်းကိုနိုင် [mɪ́ɰ̃ kò nàɪɰ̃], lit. "conqueror of kings"), is a leading democracy activist and dissident from Myanmar. He has spent most of the years since 1988 imprisoned by the state for his opposition activities. The New York Times has described him as Burma's "most influential opposition figure after Daw Aung San Suu Kyi".
Min Ko Naing was born in Yangon, the third son of Thet Nyunt and Hla Kyi, a couple from Mudon in Mon State. He has three sisters: Kyi Kyi Nyunt, Ye Ye Nyunt, and Thadar Nyunt. His parents are of ethnic Mon people but Min Ko Naing has only a smattering of Mon language. He has remained involved in the Yangon's Mon community, serving a speaker on the annual Mon National Day.
Min Ko Naing began his undergrad study at the Rangoon Arts and Science University in the mid-1980s where he majored in Zoology. During his student years, he was an active member of the arts club, where he enjoyed reading, writing poems and drawing cartoons, especially satirical ones. According to classmates, Min Ko Naing was a member of a performance troupe that took part in the traditional Than Gyat competition during Thingyan (Burma's annual Water Festival) in April. Taking the name "Goat-Mouth and Spirit-Eye", the troupe performed satirical plays and sketches satirizing Burma's military government and the lack of freedom and democracy. Though the troupe was popular, it also attracted the attention of Burmese Military Intelligence agents, who began to track Min Ko Naing's movements. Despite the illegality of forming student unions in Burma, Min Ko Naing and other students formed clandestine study groups to discuss Burma's political situation, which grew into a secret student union.
In September 1987, Ne Win voided most denominations of the kyat without warning, causing many people to lose their savings overnight. Students who saved money for tuition fees were particularly affected. The announcement led to riots at several universities. The situation was further exacerbated by the shooting of protesting student Phone Maw in a 12 March 1988 clash with police. On 16 March, Min Ko Naing organized a rally of 3,000 students on the RASU campus in which he spoke about the role of student movements in Burmese history. When the students attempted to march to the Rangoon Institute of Technology, where Phone Maw had been killed, they encountered a barbed wire barricade at Inya Lake and were attacked by riot police, resulting in several deaths and many arrests.
Shortly after this, Ne Win's government closed the universities, and the movement went underground. Min Ko Naing continued to organize protesters and circulate posters of the violence at Inya Lake. Ne Win soon agreed to step down from office, and on 7 July, many imprisoned student activists were released. The following day, Min Ko Naing and others released the first statement in the name of the new All Burma Federation of Student Unions (ABFSU), an organization that had previously been known for its struggle against British colonial rule: "We shouldn't be swayed by the release of our fellow students. We will continue to fight."The ABSFU continued to release statements by Min Ko Naing urging protests to the military government, including one calling for a general strike on 8-8-88, a number that would later become synonymous with the movement itself.
The 8-8-88 general strike drew hundreds of thousands of people to the streets of Yangon, and is widely seen as a turning point in the Burmese democracy movement. Min Ko Naing continued to speak to crowds in front of the US Embassy and Rangoon General Hospital, the sites of previous killings of protesters by Burmese government forces. He also arranged for the daughter of independence hero Aung San, Aung San Suu Kyi, to make her first speech to a crowd at Shwedagon Pagoda. Aung San Suu Kyi would go on to be elected prime minister in the 1990 general election, only to be denied office and imprisoned by the State Law and Order Restoration Council, the new military government.
The protests lasted until 18 September, at which point soldiers opened fire on the crowds, resulting in at least 3,000 deaths.
Forced to go underground, Min Ko Naing continued his organizing work while moving from house to house every night to avoid arrest. After several months, he was captured along with other students. He was sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment, under Section 5(j) of the 1950 Emergency Provisions Act for instigating "disturbances to the detriment of law and order, peace and tranquility". His sentence was commuted to 10 years under a general amnesty in January 1993. He was considered a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International, which intensively campaigned for his release.