Australian journalist Phil Thornton has written an article in The Nation about recently deceased Karen National Union leader, General Bo Mya. The article is based on interviews conducted for Thornton’s book, Restless Souls.
Thornton writes:
I asked Bo Mya if he was a “warlord”. The question started a laugh deep inside him that continued until it finally erupted. “It seems like I was. In the past we [ethnic leaders] may have acted like warlords, but underneath we all wanted to contribute for a genuine federation of Burma.”
6 responses so far ↓
1 Aung Kyaw // Dec 31, 2006 at 9:17 pm
What Bo Mya said dispels the myth among many Burmans (like myself, unfortunately) that ethnic rebel groups do not aim to remain in the Union of Burma, but are trying to secede and create their own countries.
2 Jon Fernquest // Jan 3, 2007 at 2:45 pm
An oral history of the Moei River Valley (c. 1962-1995) along the lines of the Golden Boat project at new Mandala to capture this history before the participants pass away would fill a large historical gap. I only spent two months there in theearly 1990s but the variety of different kinds of people living from Mae Sot to Sub Moei was quite surprising: Father Joseph with his mission in the Jungle, Anglican villages in the jungle with a strange mixture of self-reliant hill Karens and city-town Karens from Yangon or Paan, the Rohengyas in Mae Sot, a Karen-Muslim village, the refugee camps, Thai villages split between a hill Karen Thai government headman and the KNU, a variety of political parties, I remember meeting the head of the Arakan Communist party and a supposedly the sole remaining survivor of U Nu’s jungle resistance movement in the 1960s, that famous elderly female Karen KNU fighter at Bo Ba Ta refugee camp, doctor Cynthia who won the Magsaysay prize, the Burmese students in the ABSDF and their tenuous coexistence in Karen villages, their split, the Christian NGOs and the refugees and the camps and detention centers they were held in, the western soldiers who visited Manerplaw, and the rather morbid joy they often expressed in killing Burmese, one of them was expelled from the KNU for exactly this as I remember, there was also a Soldier of Fortune article on Bo Ba Ta refugee camp, later on when I lived in Yangon, I met Burmese veterans of this war who had a completely different story that needs to be heard too, anyway there’s a lot to do.
3 Jon Fernquest // Jan 3, 2007 at 2:48 pm
I forgot to add that the whole epic tale of Manerplaw and the Mowei river valley resembles this Ming dynasty classic:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_Margin
4 Johpa // Jan 5, 2007 at 11:45 am
Aung Kyaw wrote:
What Bo Mya said dispels the myth among many Burmans (like myself, unfortunately) that ethnic rebel groups do not aim to remain in the Union of Burma, but are trying to secede and create their own countries.
What an odd statement. Despite calls for unity amongst the Karen, I have never seen any serious movement by Karens towards separation from a Burmese Union. Bo Mya never undertook any serious offensive action against the Burmese. And the Burmese Karen that I know, including some of the leaders in the overseas population, have never expressed any thoughts of total independence and have always worked closely with both ethnic Burmese and with other Burmese minority groups, with the goal being a united democratic Burma.
I am not alone in this impression. Falla, in his book True Love and Bartholomew comes to a similar conclusion.
5 Doc K // May 6, 2007 at 12:18 am
I recently returned from the Thai-Burma border area near Mae Sot and Umphaing. Although there are still many upheavals going on there and IDPs fleeing the fighting now mainly between the KNU and DKBA and others, I believe there is still a real chance for peace based on the continuing negotiation efforts with the Burmese government in Rangoon originally begun by Gen. Saw Bo Mya. Prior to his death. he entrusted this effort to Gen. Htain Maung and Col. Thera Lermu who are working towards the vision Bo Mya had of a just and honorable peace. Like Bo Mya’s initial peace initiative, these continuing peace efforts have not been well received by the KNUs political arm to the point that they are killing their own people including a local Karen Pastor Po Aye in March 2007 and also attempted the assassination of Col. Lermu and others as well as recently as April 2007. Even so, I believe the efforts will meet with success and the Karens will rally around it once a peace aggrement is finally reached. regards, Doc K.
6 nyi nyi // Sep 13, 2009 at 3:10 pm
I have some words with Mr Phil Thornton.
He praised Aung Naing about his cruel killings in Northern Burma.
I am the one detained and tortured badly.
I have already finished a novel style true story record.
I am trying to publish it now. Later, I will Sue them at ICJ.
All of the guys from northern Burma and HQ guys headed by Dr Naing Aung have to answer.
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