Burmese dissident calls for people power

Prominent Burmese dissident Ludu Sein Win has sent a message to Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) in which he calls on people around the world to unite in the struggle for freedom and justice.

Ludu Sein Win, 70, is one of Burma’s leading journalists, who spent 13 years in prison and was one of the founding members of the National League for Democracy (NLD), led by Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. CSW met him recently in Rangoon, and he gave CSW a written message.

“Dear Friends of Peace, Freedom and Justice around the world,” he writes. “I am Ludu Sein Win, a journalist and former political prisoner from Burma. I am sending this message to you to request your kind help in fighting against tyrants all over the world. Right now, the brave people of Libya, Syria, Yemen and other Middle East countries have risen up against the brutal dictators of their respective nations and to our heartfelt regret we found that hundreds of people have been killed every day by those dictators. They urgently need help from the world. We Burmese people also have been continuously fighting for our freedom for fifty years and still we are hopelessly far away from the end of our destination. During the course of this long journey thousands of innocent souls have been slain on the streets and many hundreds have been killed in the prisons. Right now more than 2000 people, especially young students, monks and women are still in the prisons. They need your help.”

Ludu Sein Win reminds readers that “more than half of the world is living under various dictatorships, deprived of all their basic human rights and suffering unbelievable miseries.” He calls on individuals and organisations around the world to unite in support of freedom. “Hundreds of thousands of ordinary people around the world are trying hard to help the suffering people. Many civic and religious organisations, international Non-Governmental Organisations (INGOs) and activists are also working to that end. If we can organise those different groups to coordinate their efforts and resources for the common cause, we can even challenge the heavens,” he writes. “I would like to ask all people of the world to unite and form ‘People Power World Wide’, in your city and in your community to work for peace, freedom and justice in our humanity. All civic and religious organisations, rights groups, aid groups, advocacy groups should co-ordinate their activities for our common cause.”

CSW’s East Asia Team Leader Benedict Rogers said, “Ludu Sein Win is a courageous campaigner for freedom, who has taken grave risks in order to speak out. In sending this message he is taking yet another risk, and we owe it to him, the people of Burma and people suffering oppression and persecution throughout the world to listen to it and respond. His message is clear: in Burma the suffering continues, the dictators remain in power and nothing has changed. We all need to work together to build public consciousness, mobilise people and organisations, and strengthen co-ordination of international solidarity with the people of Burma.”

For further information or to arrange interviews please contact Kiri Kankhwende, Press Officer at Christian Solidarity Worldwide on +44 (0)20 8329 0045 / +44 (0) 78 2332 9663, email kiri@csw.org.uk or visit www.csw.org.uk.

Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW) is a Christian organisation working for religious freedom through advocacy and human rights, in the pursuit of justice.

Notes to Editors:

1. For a copy of the letter, click here.