88 Generation Leaders Remain Defiant

By BA KAUNG Wednesday, August 25, 2010      The IRAWADDY

Three years since their arrests in August 2007, the imprisoned leaders of the 88 Generation Students group are unchanged in their common view that the conditions for the coming election are unacceptable, according to their family members and friends.
According to a political dissident in Rangoon, nine student leaders, including the prominent figures Min Ko Naing and Ko Ko Gyi, remain committed to the "Maubin Declaration," an accord they reached in Maubin prison in 2008 before they were transferred to different prisons across Burma.
According to the agreement, the group will not lend its support to a general election if the ruling junta does not make the process all-inclusive and does not release all political prisoners without conditions.
Speaking to The Irrawaddy on Wednesday, Ko Aung, the younger brother of Ko Ko Gyi. said, "My brother has not changed his position on that agreement since my last prison visit in February."
Both Min Ko Naing, 47, and Ko Ko Gyi, 48, had each spent nearly 15 years in jail as political prisoners until they were released in the years 2004 and 2005 respectively. The two student leaders were rearrested in 2007 for taking part in demonstrations against a hike in fuel prices and are currently serving 65-year sentences in different prisons in Shan State in northern Burma.
Another group member, Htay Kywe, who is jailed in western Burma, also relayed a message during a family prison visit this month that the election would be "insignificant" without the participation of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. In a recent letter to a friend in Rangoon, Htay Kywe said he was spending his time reading books on political science and economics.
Soe Tun, a 39-year-old former political prisoner and a member of the 88 Generation group, who has been in hiding since 2007, said that there is as yet no sign of jailed student leaders being freed and that the opposition parties will suffer defeats in the coming election.
"Instead, the regime will increase suppression of its political opponents," he said in a recent audio message to The Irrawaddy. However, he emphasized the importance of opposition groups not attacking pro-democracy parties contesting the election.
The regime election laws bar all political prisoners, including Suu Kyi, from the voting process. The US government recently said the election would be lacking in legitimacy without the release of political prisoners.
The Thailand-based NGO, Assistance Association for Political Prisoners in Burma (AAPP), has estimated that more than 2,000 political prisoners are currently languishing in Burmese jails.
On Tuesday, the Burmese military authorities released more than 100 people from jail, none of whom were political prisoners, said AAPP.