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November 22nd, 2008

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Prague protesters join a worthy global cause
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October 3rd, 2007 issue

The current uprising in Burma has already been tagged by some circles, including folks at Burma Center Prague, as the “Saffron Revolution.”

While we appreciate the sentiment behind a name that inevitably recalls the Velvet Revolution here, the most striking pictures posted on web sites over the past week and a half have not been of victorious crowds gathering in a city square. Instead, they’ve shown military troops beating and shooting protesters, and the bloody saffron robes of wounded monks.

That blood is definitely a measure of how strongly the monks believe in their cause. But it also suggests that the brutal military regime in Burma isn’t likely to relax its iron grip anytime soon. If anything, security forces have reacted by getting more vicious, invading monasteries and patrolling popular rallying sites such as temples and streets in downtown Rangoon. At press time, thousands of monks were reportedly being held in a technical university building and at a stadium.

So, in that sense, the current events seem less reminiscent of the Velvet Revolution than Prague Spring, when the brief flourish of freedom here led to a crackdown by Soviet troops.

Either way, this is a country sensitive to the tyranny of political oppression, which makes the local demonstration of support for the people of Burma an appropriate and laudatory gesture (see story, A1).

The Velvet Revolution was preceded by the “People Power” revolution in the Philippines in 1986, which forced former ruler Ferdinand Marcos out of the country. A year after the Velvet Revolution, the students of “Otpor” (Resistance) in Serbia, backed by the U.S. government, managed to overthrow Slobodan Milosević. (Many of the members of Otpor later helped similar youth movements throughout Eastern Europe, with varying degrees of success.)

Then the naming trend blossomed with the “Rose Revolution” that toppled former President Eduard Sverdnadze in the Republic of Georgia, and the “Orange Revolution” that changed the Ukrainian government in 2004.

Unfortunately, in the case of Burma, it seems unlikely that an internal uprising will be enough to topple the country’s military dictators. The current protests are just the latest chapter in the country’s repressive history. Thousands were slaughtered during the last major uprising in 1988. And Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the country’s resistance movement, has been under house arrest for more than a decade, even after former Czech President Václav Havel nominated her for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991.

All of which makes censure and pressure by the world community critically important.

In this age of instant communication, it is easy to sway world opinion. It is much harder to battle with military goon squads and unseat a regime that rules with an iron fist.

U.S. President George W. Bush showed an uncharacteristic enlightened moment last week when he told the United Nations that “Americans are outraged by the situation in Burma,” and vowed to tighten economic sanctions on the country’s leaders and their financial backers. The rest of the world should follow suit.

Grassroots support will be important as well, which is one of the reasons it was encouraging to see the demonstration in Prague this past weekend. Local organizers have planned another demonstration this week in front of the Chinese Embassy, a strategem we applaud. China is one of Burma’s leading trading partners, and more to the point, particularly sensitive to its global image right now, in the wake of the poison toys scandal and the Olympics on tap in Beijing next year. So it offers a key point of leverage.

To local protesters, we offer our gratitude for speaking out and encouragement to keep up the pressure. And to the courageous people in Burma, their supporters around the world, and indeed to everyone willing to speak out against authoritarian regimes, we say good luck and Godspeed.

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