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Burma's Four Nines Uprising
September 1, 1999 Media Advisory
Ottawa Group Supports Burma’s “Four Nines” Uprising -
The Ottawa Burma Roundtable is one of the many groups supporting the upcoming
September 9, 1999 uprising in Burma. Joining the ranks of Burma pro-democracy
advocates in over 30 countries, the Roundtable will be raising awareness and
support for the people of Burma through a day of fasting and demonstrations,
starting at 9:00 am on Parliament Hill.
Burmese dissidents in exile are predicting that September 9 - the
numerologically significant 9.9.99 - will be the day the masses in Burma again
rise up against the junta. They base their hopes on a similarly auspicious
date
11 years ago - August 8, 1988 (8.8.88) - when massive pro-democracy
demonstrations began in Rangoon and spread across the country until they were
brutally crushed by the army and thousands of peaceful protestors were killed.
The Ottawa Burma Roundtable will be holding a one-day fast on Parliament Hill
to draw support for the people of Burma’s resistance to military rule. The
aims
of this action are as follows:
To demand that Burma’s junta enter into dialogue with Burma’s
democratically-elected National League for Democracy (NLD) and leaders of the
ethnic nationalities.
To call on Burma’s generals to immediately and unconditionally release all
political prisoners.
To demand Burma’s military stop all violations of human rights, in particular
the unlawful coercion against the NLD members and other pro-democracy supports
and the brutal repression of Burma’s ethnic nationality groups.
To demand the cessation of forced labour, which according to the United
Nation’s International Labour Organization (ILO) is widespread throughout
Burma.
To educate Canadians on the human rights situation in Burma which includes:
rape, torture, summary execution, arbitrary arrest, forced labour, and forced
relocation, and to demonstrate the global interconnectedness of human rights
(i.e. that abuses in one part of the world affect those in other parts of the
world).
To urge the Canadian Government to impose full economic sanctions against
Burma
so that Canadian companies cannot continue to invest hundreds of millions of
dollars in, and import millions of dollars worth of garments from, Burma’s
military apparatus. The money in turn goes to propping up Burma’s “Narco”
Dictatorship.
To urge the Canadian Government to impose full economic sanctions also as a
way
to bring down a regime which depends mostly on foreign investment and trade
and, to a large extent, on the illegal drug trade. Canadians are feeling the
effects of Burma’s massive opium industry as heroin addiction and trafficking
continues to explode in Canadian cities. Most of the heroin comes from Burma.
To call on the Canadian parliament to recognize the Committee to Represent the
People’s Parliament (CRPP) as the legitimate instrument of the will of the
Burmese people. The CRPP was formed by the NLD on September 16, 1998 with the
legal authority of the majority of NLD elected members of parliament.
To urge Canadians to do what Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has requested
time
and time again: “that you use your liberty to help promote ours”.
For more information, contact Ottawa Burma Roundtable at (613) 237-8056
Canadian Friends of Burma
145 Spruce St.#206
Ottawa, Ontario
K1R 6P1
Canada
Tel: 613-237-8056 Fax: 613-563-0017
email: cfob@web.net www.web.net/~cfob
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