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The fight for media freedom in Burma continues
Irrawaddy - May 4, 2011
Simon Roughneen, Bangkok – "I heard that some of the 88 Generation Students were gathering in Rangoon, that there would be a demonstration," recounts Aung Htun (pseudonym), a Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB) journalist based in Mae Sot, Thailand.
It was mid-August 2007, he said, and public anger at Burma's rising food and fuel prices was increasing. The resulting demonstrations culminated in an army crackdown, during which hundreds of protestors and Buddhist monks were arrested and jailed.
Some of those arrested were undercover journalists who, like Aung Htun, were filming the demonstrations and sending the recordings to DVB colleagues outside Burma.
Portions of the videos were used by international news networks who had been denied access to the country, and these recordings provided the world with iconic images of saffron-clad monks marching around Rangoon and other Burmese cities in an unprecedented display of defiance against the country's military Government.
"I arrived late, and the demonstration was over," said Aung Htun. But that did not mean he was out of danger.
Military intelligence and informers were still keeping an eye on the location, and his presence drew attention even though his camera was hidden and there was no overt indication of his secret profession.
"I was soon stopped by plainclothes guys, who asked me why I was walking around the street where the demonstrations took place," Aung Htun said.
He was promptly taken to a nearby government office, where questioning began: "Who are you? What are you doing here today? Where do you live?"
When a crowd gathered outside, apparently in reaction to word getting out that someone had been taken to the building for interogation, the officials decided to move Aung Htun to Rangoon's City Hall. "They did not want to provoke another gathering or demonstration," he said.
By that stage, the authorities had found Aung Htun's videocamera hidden in his backpack, and at the City Hall they asked him if he was a journalist. He replied that he was not, and when they asked him to show them what he had recorded, he said he had nothing.
In addition, he simultaneously realized that they did not know how to operate the camera. "I ran the camera on shooting mode," he said, a simple ruse that was enough to convince the investigators that he had not recorded any demonstrations.
Aung Htun was eventually let go, most likely as a ploy by authorities hoping that he would lead them to other DVB reporters and expose a wider network of clandestine Burmese journalists. "I was one of the lucky ones," he recalled.
The same cannot be said of Hla Hla Win, Sithu Zeya, Maung Maung Zeya, Ngwe Soe Lin and Win Maw, all DVB reporters who are serving jail sentences ranging from 8 to 27 years after being caught in one of the world's most draconian media dragnets since the 2007 Saffron protests.
Tuesday was World Press Freedom Day, and on Wednesay the DVB launched a campaign to have their jailed journalists freed amid rumors that some form of prisoner amnesty will be announced by Burma's president, former Gen Thein Sein, at this week's Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit in Jakarta, Indonesia.
It is unclear whether the latest amnesty will include any of the almost 2,200 political prisoners in Burma, a figure that includes the second highest number of jailed journalists of any country in the world, measured on a population basis, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
In his inaugural address, President Thein Sein referred to the media as the fourth estate. However, David Mathieson, Burma expert at Human Rights Watch, is skeptical that the Burkean reference means that a major relaxation of Burma's notorious media restrictions is on the cards.
"Mendacity is the main aspect of the message in Burma these days," Mathieson said. "The Burmese authorities have come up with 'a military-parliamentary complex' to fashion an image that some reform is taking place, when in reality they are just making small, token concessions here and there."
"Media is part of this, and sadly a lot of Western governments are going along with it even though no open discussion or coverage of core political issues is permitted in Burma," he said.
Given Burma's highly-restricted media environment, getting news about the country to the outside world has been left to Burmese media groups operating outside the country but with clandestine reporters on the inside, such as DVB, Mizzima and The Irrawaddy.
Unable to sell newspapers in their natural marketplace inside Burma, these agencies are in part supported by donor governments and private philanthropies as a means to ensure that there is some uncensored Burmese news media.
However, noting recent funding cuts for Burma's "exile media," CPJ Southeast Asia representative Shawn Crispin wondered if donor countries, particularly in Europe, were trying to curry favor with the Burmese Government by reducing support to Burmese media outside the country, of whom the Burmese government has been highly-critical.
"We are seen as enemies of the state," says Toe Zaw Latt, the DVB's Chiang Mai, Thailand bureau chief.
On Thursday, the European Union and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) will stage a business meeting in Jakarta, before the main Asean summit, which will be addressed by Aung Khin Myint, the chairman of the Myanmar International Freight Forwarders Association (AFFA).
While the Burmese government has little track record of responding positively to international lobbying on political or human rights issues, Marwaan Macaan Markar, a Sri Lankan correspondent for Inter-Press News, says that the assistance of groups such as CPJ and Reporters Without Borders was crucial in helping threatened journalists in his own country to flee abroad, and to raise awareness about cases when reporters were jailed or tortured.
"It is always a difficult decision on whether or not to go public or international in these cases," he says. "It can really antagonize the government concerned."
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