Courage in the face of injustice
Saturday, May 16th, 2009
Daw Aung San Suu Kyi
There are few individuals who have the strength to uphold their principles in the face of violence and oppression. Aung San Suu Kyi is such a person. British Prime Minister,Gordon Brown said “Suu Kyi’s courage is the courage to sacrifice her own happiness and a comfortable life so that, through her struggle, she might win the right of an entire nation to seek happy and comfortable lives. It is the absolute expression of selflessness. Paradoxically, in sacrificing her own liberty, she strengthens its cry and bolsters its claim for the people she represents”
Today, Burma’s pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has spent 13 years and 204 days in detention.
Her “crime”?
Believing in human rights and having the courage and strength to uphold her ideals.
Since winning the presidential election by an 82% margin in 1990, Aung San Suu Kyi has spent over 19 years in and out of detained arrest. Since her original detention the military regime has continued to make excuses to continue her detention. This year is no exception. May 27th, 2009, was to be the end of this long endured injustice, however on May 14th 2009, Aung San Suu Kyi was arrested for allegedly breaching the terms of her arrest after an uninvited American man broke into her home. She was taken to Insein Prison; notorious for its horrific conditions and abusive treatment of detainees, she is being denied medical treatment by her captors who are aware of her fragile health.
I think Aung San Suu Kyi herself describes this injustice profoundly in her “Freedom From Fear” Address: “It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.”
The question remains: How can we transform this fear, disseminate the need for power over others and build our own inner strength?
