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This is an unofficial translation of the transcript of an interview of Ven.
Kumudra, a Burmese monk who was arrested, forced to serve as a porter, but
escaped and fled to the Thai border. The interview was conducted by Ven
Khemasara, Chairman of All Burma Young Monks' Union (ABYMU), on 20 April,
1996.  Ven. Kumudra is also a member of ABYMU. 

(A copy of the original taped interview (in Burmese) is available from
Buddhist Relief Mission.  To receive a copy, please send your mailing
address to: brelief@xxxxxxx  (Do not REPLY to this message, since that would
be transmitted to all recipients of BurmaNet.)  The cassette tape is free of
charge, but we would appreciate reimbursement for postage.)

Text:

Q:   Where are you from?

A:   Yitkan Village, Sa ku Township, Magwe Division.

Q:   Are your parents still living?

A:   Yes, they are.

Q:   What was your name as a layman?

A:   Kyaw Win 

Q :   And your monk's name?

A:   U Kumudra

Q:   When were you born?

A:   I was born on Tankhu, Fifth full moon day, 1323 (1961, April)

Q:   How old are you?

A:   Thirty-five years old.

Q:   When did you ordain as a novice?

A:   At the age of 17.

Q:   Did you study formally?

A:   Yes, until the eighth grade.  After I failed the exam, I ordained as a
novice.

Q:   Did you ordain to be a monk at the age of 20?

A:   Yes I did.

Q:   Did you start studying Dhamma as a novice?

A:   I studied at the Thu-kha-wadi Monastery (which is devoted to Dhamma
teaching), Kyauk Pa Daung, for four years.

Q:   After that? 

A:   After that I studied at Maha-ta-ni-kar Yame Monastery (Magwe Division)
under Sayadaw U Than Thar-wara, Elementary, intermediate, and advanced levels.

Q:   Who is your Au pyit je (ordination teacher)?

A:   Sayadaw U Nandiya (Yit Kan Village, Pegu)

Q:   Who sponsored you in your monk's ordination?

A:   My uncle, U Ba Ohm, and Daw Shwe Thauk.

Q:   Did you study Dhamma anywhere else?

A:   I studied advanced level Dhamma under Sayadaw U Kon Ta La of Prome
Lawtikayon Monastery.

Q:   Did you study anywhere else?

A:   In Magwe Divison, at Pwint Phya, Magwe and in Pegu Division, at Prome
Zaw Ti Ka Yon.

Q:   How many wasa (rainy seasons) did you study?

A:   Ten wasa as a monk.

Q:   Until 1988?

A:   That's right.

Q:   Why do you think you were arrested?

A:   Because I was active with the All Burma Young Monks' Union.

Q:   What was your responsibility?

A:   As the third line leader responsible for administration of the
organization.  

Q:   When were you arrested?

A:   At the end of December 1989.[1990?, ed.]

Q:   After the Sangha's boycott?

A:   Yes.

Q:   Do you think you were arrested because you were involved in struggles
for human rights, democracy and peace in Burma?

A:   No, not really.  We saw the atrocities the military regime committed on
the people and we knew how they mismanaged governing the country.  We, thehe
monks coordinated our efforts with the movement and tried to create a
situation in accordance with the teachings of Buddha.  Our good intentions
were ignored, our movement was blamed for creating unrest among the people,
we were accused, and arrested. 

Q:   Before 1988, did you take part in any political action?

A:   Only in 1988.  Then 400,000 monks united and coordinated for the good
of the people.

Q:   Do you mean that you were not at all involved in politics before 1988.

A:   Yes, that is right.  Not at all.

A:   Forty, or fifty, or maybe sixty monks.

Q:   In Prome?

A:   Yes.  The SLORC planned to imprison six leading monks including me.
Tike-tar Sayadaw got four monks released from jail but two of us remained in
another prison because Sayadaw could not find us.

Q:   Who arrested you?

A:   Police officer Khin Maung Zaw of No. 1 Police Station and LORC member
Saw Yan Naing.

Q:   Were you put in jail?

A:   Yes, for 28 days.

Q:   How were you interrogated?

A:   We were beaten whenever we were interrogated.  Of course, we were
afraid of interrogations.

Q:   Were you in monks' robes or laymen's clothes?

A:   At first I was in robes, but later I was forced to disrobe, but I
stayed in accordance with the vinaya (monks' discipline).  We were forced
against our will to disrobe.

Q:   Were you in prison at that time?

A:   Yes, but I was in monks robes for 28 days at the police station jail.

Q:   Were you beaten even though you were in robes?

A:   Yes, I was.

Q:   What happened in the prison?

A:   I was told I would be put on trial.  Finally I was tried by the
military tribunal.

Q:   Did you have a lawyer?

A:   No.  They accused me and gave me a sentence.

Q:   What was the sentence?  How many years imprisonment?

A:   Eleven years.

Q:   What were the charges?

A:   Creating unrest during the uprising and using narcotics.  They charged
us and sentenced us by themselves.

Q:   How long were you in prison?

A:   I was in prison until 1994.

Q:   Were you the only monk or were there other monks with you also?

A:   The other monks were sent to Taungyi, Meik-Hti-la, and Myin-chan jails.

Q:   Were they also charged with involvement in the 1988 uprising?

A:   Yes, the same charges.

Q:   Were you beaten in prison?

A:   Yes, I was.

Q:   Daily?

A:   Yes, daily.  Even oxen have time to rest.  We were treated even worse
than oxen.  Because I was sentenced to a long term of imprisonment, I was
shackled, with an iron rod rather than a chain between my ankles. 

Q:   Can you tell me about other tortures you were subjected to?

A:   We were beaten with solid bamboo staves.

Q:   On the head?

A:   On both the head and the back.

Q:   Individually?

A:   Yes.

Q:   How many times a day were you beaten?

A:   Twice a day--once in the morning and once in the evening.

Q:   Why did they beat you?  Was it because they could not get answers from you?

A:   Even if we gave them the right answers, they beat us, saying that they
were not the answers they wanted.

Q:   Were you sent to any work sites?  If so, where and when?

A:   In 1992 I was sent to Be Lu Chaung Hydro-electric Power Plant Project
near Loi Kaw in Kayah (Karenni) State.  There we had to work for a Japanese
company. 

Q:   A hydroelectric power project?

A:   Yes.  We were forced to work like oxen.

Q:   How many hours a day did you work?

A:   We started at six o'clock in the morning and worked until four-thirty
in the afternoon.

Q:   How about food?

A:   There was never enough food and what there was like pig's slop, not fit
for human beings.

Q:   What kinds of dishes did you get?

A:   Only Ta-la-paw (a Karen staple porridge made of rice powder, boiled in
water, salt and available vegetables) and fish paste.

Q:   How about prison food?

A:   No better than pig swill.  I could not eat it for a month.

Q:   Did you get two meals a day?

A:   That's right.  One in the orning and one in the evening.

Q:   Did they feed you as a monk or as a layman?

A:   As a layman, but all the prison staff called me "pongyi" (which means
monk, but is never used as a form of address; to do so is rude).  

Q:   How long were you in Loi Kaw?

A:   For 1992, 1993, 1994, for more than three years.  At the ceremony
inaugurating work on the power plant, the Second Secretary of the SLORC,
General Tin Oo came and gave a speech.  He announced that we, all prisoners,
will be released at the end of the project.  Because of that prisoners
worked happily.  The prison warden said that such high authorities never
lie.  At the end of the project, instead of being released as promised, we
were taken by Kaya (Karenni) State Regional Military Commander for forced
labor and made to work as porters. 

Q:   When was that?

A:   In December of 1994.  We served as porters from Pa Saung (Kayah State)
to Karen State.  At first they said only seven days.  On the way back, we
were handed over to the Light Infantry Regiment #428.

Q:   How many months were you there?

A:   We spent over three months as porters in the jungle.  Many died of
malaria and starvation.  The rest of us expected that we too would die.
Q:   How many porters were there?

A:   There were between seven hundred and eight hundred porters there.

Q:   Were there any other monks?

A:   Yes, there were many monks who had been forcibly disrobed.  They were
not disrobed according to the proper disrobing procedures.  They were
tortured and forced to sign a paper stating they had disrobed.  They were
tortured, so they signed.
Q:   Who were they? 

A:   Together with me was a monk whose lay name was Maung Myint Shwe, from
Irrawaddy Division.  He was forced to disrobe, not disrobed properly. He was
also imprisoned for involvement in the 1988 uprising.

Q:   Were there other monks there?  Where were they from?

A:   Yes.  Some were from Meik-Hti-La and Bassein prisons.  All of them had
been arbitrarily arrested and imprisoned for participating in the 1988
pro-democracy movement.  Some were older than us.  Even some senior monks
were porters with us.

Q:   What was the difference between porters' food and soldiers' rations?

A:   We were only given a lid-full of rice from a "hango" (army rice cooker)
That amounted to only  half of a tin plate of rice.  The soldiers had tinned
fish, meat, and beans.  We heard that there was a ration for porters, but we
never received it.  We were gien only 10 condensed milk tins of rice (about
2.5 kilograms) for fifty people.

Q:   Did you get any money for your labor?

A:   No, we didn't Actually they confiscated any money we had.

Q:   Were there women porters?

A:   Yes, there were about 25 women.  Karen women of different ages, from
the small villages from the Pa-pon area. 

Q:   Let's change the subject back to the jail.  Did you have to do hard
labor in prison?

A:   Yes.  We had to dig drainage canals, dig out rocks, and carry dirt. We
were forced to work like oxen with insufficient food.

Q:   What work did you do at the hydroelectric power project.

A:   Early in the morning we were taken by truck to the work site.  There we
had to dig, carry travel, mix cement, and carry iron bars.  We could not say
no.  The soldiers guarding us used to say, "It doesn't matter about the hole
in the canteen.  What we want is water!"

Q:   How did you reach the border? 

A:   We ran away.

Q:   How many of you ran away together?

A:   Three of us.  Ga Maw (a Kachin), Po Wa (a Po Karen), and myself.  When
we were asked to fetch water, we crossed the river, using an empty plastic
canteen as a flotation device.  Before we escaped, 14 or 15 others had
already run away.

Q:   Did the escapees include soldiers.

A:   Yes.  One soldier, Hla Maung Thein (an Arakanese) from LIR#429 escaped
with his gun, 200 bullets, 3 tins of meat, and 2 tins of beans.  He escaped
at a place near the Htee-mu-hta pagoda.

Q:   Did soldiers follow and try to capture him?

A:   Yes and they did shoot at him too, but because he had his gun, the
others dared not follow.

Q:   Are the SLORC soldiers depressed?

A:   Yes.  Because we had to stay at the top of a very high mountain, called
"Monkey Cry Hill" they used to complain that their orders caused them a lot
of troubles.  Water was difficult to get; the weather was terrible; supplies
were not sufficient; and they could easily be attacked.  I remember Sargent
Aye Myint and Ko Myint Thein.  They also said they wanted to quit the army,
but they were not allowed to resign.

Q:   Do you want to say anything about the military junta which has
controlled the country since 1988?

A:   We know that it is a regime that took government power by arms and by
oppressing the people.  They force the people to work.  They repatriate
villagers.  We don't like them.  None of the people like them.  It is an
unfair government.

Q:   Do you think the revolution, including the students' struggle, will be
successful some day?

A:   I believe it will succeed.  As long as the military regime is in power,
I have decided to continue the struggle against their injustices with diligence.

Q:   What did you do when you first arrived here?

A:   I first stayed in a Karen village in laymen's clothing, but I still
believed that I was a monk.  The only thing was that they (SLORC) beat me
and forced me to disrobe.  Then I met the students and ordained to be a monk
again.

Q:   According to vinaya, you are still a monk.  Beating and torturing by
SLORC is their akusala (evil and unskillful) deeds.

--End of text
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