Irrawaddy-July 8

Former political prisoner Daw Hnin Si hasn’t forgotten how she and fellow inmates were beaten and tortured in 2021 by prison authorities in Mandalay’s Obo Prison for celebrating Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s birthday. Daw Hnin Si, in her early forties, was detained in Obo Prison for three months for participating in anti-regime protests sparked by last year’s coup. On the morning of June 19, 2021 she and other political prisoners marked Daw Aung San Suu Kyi’s 76th birthday by wearing new clothes, thanaka and roses. Then, in defiance of the military regime, the prison’s nearly 500 political prisoners shouted loud birthday greetings for Suu Kyi, who was under house arrest at the time. Prison authorities arrived at once. They locked the female prisoners’ cellblock first. Then, they entered the cellblock for male prisoners and beat the political detainees. During the protest, one male prisoner was beaten to death and many more were injured. Moreover, over 200 of the male political prisoners were moved to solitary confinement. Luckily for the female political detainees, they were only given a stern warning. The incident at Obo Prison in June 2021 was just one example of how political prisoners across Myanmar have kept defying the junta, despite being behind bars and faced with brutal persecution by prison officials.

Following the regime’s crackdowns on the nationwide anti-coup protests, Myanmar today now has some 11,443 political detainees. It’s the largest number Myanmar has ever had, despite the country being rocked by political unrest ever since General Ne Win’s coup of 1962, according to  rights group the Assistance Association of Political Prisoners (AAPP). Myanmar’s prisons are notorious for their poor conditions, rudimentary healthcare and oppressive regimes. It is political prisoners who suffer the most. The harsh conditions and brutal oppression in the country’s jails have failed to crush the political prisoners’ defiance and revolutionary spirit, as they continue to stage protests against the junta. Over the last year, there have been at least 22 prison protests. Read more at: https://www.irrawaddy.com/news/burma/revolutionary-spirit-still-strong-in-myanmars-deadly-prisons.html