SDU/SHAN DEMOCRATIC UNION - Press R

[Rangoonp@xxxxxxx]

Subject: SDU/SHAN DEMOCRATIC UNION - Press Release, March 29, 1999

1 April 1999:

SDU/SHAN DEMOCRATIC UNION - Press Release, March 29, 1999

On behalf of the people of Shan State, we extend to Daw Aung San Suukyi
and her sons, our sorrow and condolence for the loss of Dr. Michael
Aris.
We are deeply moved. The people of Shan understand what it is to suffer,
to be victims of those who purport to govern and claim to have kept the
country "united".

We call upon the military junta - SPDC/State Peace and Development
Council -- to facilitate the travel and return of Daw Aung San Suukkyi
to
attend Dr.Michael Aris's funeral in England.

It is disgraceful enough that the military junta chose to play politics
with the suffering of both Dr.Aris and Daw Suukyi, and their sons. The
junta has no one to blame but itself for the fresh round of condemnation
from the United Nations -- General Secretary, Mr.Koffi Anan, no less --
various governments, and decent people everywhere. At the very least,
Foreign Minister Win Aung should resign for his mishandling of the
matter.

Rangoon ruling generals like to pose as good Buddhists. But their daily
circuses at pagodas and monasteries ring hollow: they are contradicted
by
their patent lack of Buddhist compassion and metta for fellow human
beings -- Daw Suukyi, Dr.Aris, their two sons and many thousands of
Shan,
Karen, Karenni, Mon, Rakhine, Chin who have been evicted at gunpoint
from
their homes, fields, gardens, and killed, raped, robbed, pauperized, and
thousands of children orphaned and traumatized.

We call upon the military junta to recognize and deal with reality
instead of being driven by illusions, illusions born out of fear and
greed
and hatred. One reality is that Daw Suukyi is a citizen of Burma, and
another is that as a citizen, she has the right to live in her country,
and she moreover has every right to point out -- as she has done -- that
the country belongs to the people, that Burma is not the private estate
of men in uniform.

SHAN DEMOCRATIC UNION/SDU
March 29, 1999.