Madam, - This time last year the world watched as Buddhist monks took to the streets of Burma in a brave protest against rising fuel and food prices. On our television screens we saw inspiring scenes as the monks in their thousands demonstrated peacefully, concerned for the welfare of their hungry and deprived fellow-citizens. The latter in turn came out to show their respect for the monks, and to protect them from attack by the ruling military regime.
Sad to recall, hope quickly turned to horror as a shocked world saw the peaceful demonstrators being brutally attacked, heavily beaten, and shot at.- In fact a foreign press photographer was shot dead as we watched. Eyewitness reports say that many died that day.
On the night of September 26th army units raided many monasteries in and around Rangoon. Monks were dragged out of their beds and violently assaulted. Many were arrested and forcibly removed to detention centres. Within a week a number of monasteries were empty and thousands of monks arrested and imprisoned. Some were ordered to return to their home towns, while others fled in fear, many escaping to Thailand. People suspected of aiding the monks suffered the same treatment. During the past year the number of political prisoners has almost doubled. The conditions in which prisoners are held at the pleasure of the generals are unspeakably foul, overcrowded and unhygienic.
One year after the savage suppression of the "saffron revolution" it seems that the long-suffering people of Burma are no nearer the freedom and democracy they crave. The elected democratic leader Aung San Suu Kyi, a freeman of Dublin, now in her 13th year of house arrest, is on record as saying: "I hope the world will not forget us". It is hard not to come to the conclusion that the world which watched with compassion this time last year has done just that. - Yours, etc,
GEARÓID KILGALLEN, Chairperson, Burma Action Ireland, Dublin 1.