Monday
31 October 6–9 p.m.
Urgend humanitarian intervention needed Everyone remembers images of the hundreds of thousands of saffron-robed monks marching through the streets of Burma, chanting the Metta Sutta in 2007. One of the main organizers of the peaceful uprising was Ashin Gambira. We now have very alarming details of his current condition in prison.
Urgend humanitarian intervention needed Everyone remembers images of the hundreds of thousands of saffron-robed monks marching through the streets of Burma, chanting the Metta Sutta in 2007. One of the main organizers of the peaceful uprising was Ashin Gambira. We now have very alarming details of his current condition in prison.
Ashin Gambira, a young Buddhist monk
and a leader of the All Burma Monks’ Alliance (ABMA), has been sentenced to 63
years in prison for his role in organizing these peaceful protests. He has not
committed any crime for which he deserves to be imprisoned.
He
is one of around 200 Buddhist monks that are still behind bars and subjected to
regular mistreatment. U Gambira is currently being held in the remote Kalay
Prison, far from his family and friends. He is suffering from serious back and
head pain as a consequence of repeatedly being interrogated and tortured.
After prisoners who were released
from Kalay Prison on 12 October reported about the deteriorating health of the
monk U Gambira, Wong Kai Shing, Executive Director of the Asian Human Rights
Commission, wrote an open letter to Burma’s president U Thein Sein. In this
letter he asked for the “prompt transfer back to a facility in Yangon where
Ashin Gambira can receive appropriate treatment and also be close to his
family”.
Fellow inmates have told of the monk
“suffering from fits, in which he frequently cries out in pain and clutches at
his head. The prison authorities then have to hold him down to administer a
drug via injection, perhaps a sedative, after which he goes quiet and falls
unconscious. When he comes out of unconsciousness, he slurs his speech.”
Both the physical and mental health
of U Gambira seem to be in very precarious situations. He clearly requires
urgent medical treatment and an end to the abuse at the hands of the prison
authorities. There is no hospital and no staff doctor at Kalay Prison.
To raise awareness about Ashin
Gambira and all of the political prisoners in Burma, we ask you all to light
a candle on Monday 31 October. Meet with friends in public, or light a
candle at home. Then upload a photo of the candle to our event page to
show your support for the call to free Ashin Gambira and all political prisoners
in Burma immediately.
by Alexandra Rösch
