London, 1 February, 2022: The London-based NGO, MAP, is launching a global campaign, ‘Junk the Junta’, against the Myanmar generals, who seized power in a military coup a year ago.
The official launch will take place at a protest rally at the Myanmar Embassy in London on 1 February, due to be attended by hundreds of people including those whose family members have been tortured and killed since the coup.
‘In the last year, coup leader, Min Aung Hlaing and his clique have unleashed an industrial scale terror campaign which has seen over fifteen hundred people killed and nine thousand illegally detained, many tortured to death in prison”, said MAP Director, Chris Gunness. “Following the unanimous rejection by the UN General Assembly of the junta’s credentials, our campaign will track junta officials as they attempt to take up seats in international organisations, naming and shaming them.”
Gunness, who covered the 1988 democracy revolution for the BBC, continued “after the 8888 was brutally crushed, the world forgot the Burmese people for two decades. We cannot allow history to repeat itself.”
Golden Globe winner and Oscar Nominee, Yoni Goodman, has created an animation and a GIF for the Junk the Junta campaign, depicting Min Aung Hlaing as a marauding hyena spoiling ballot papers, which is screwed into a ball and chucked in the bin.
In an open letter to Min Aung Hlaing delivered to the Myanmar embassy Gunness said the coup leader was personally criminally responsible for massacres, indiscriminate aerial bombardments of villages, widespread arson attacks, mass disappearances and forced displacement, that has seen the number of Myanmar citizens driven from their homes rise to over half a million, including tens of thousands in neighbouring India, China and Thailand.
“This clearly meets the threshold of crimes against humanity and war crimes under the Rome Statute which established the International Criminal Court”, said Gunness, “which is why MAP has filed a case against Min Aung Hlaing at the ICC.”
Between 1 February 2021 and 31 December 2021, there were 7,686 armed clashes and attacks on civilians, a 715 per cent increase from the same period in 2020. “This puts Myanmar on a par with the most barbaric conflicts of our age”, said Gunness, “comparable with Syria (7,742), and higher than Afghanistan (6,481), Yemen (6,270), and Iraq (3,732). In the last four months of 2021, Myanmar has overtaken all of these.”
Since October 2020, there has been a marked escalation in the disproportionate war with the ethnic nationality groups in Myanmar’s periphery: whole villages have been shelled and torched. Civilian targets such as churches, schools and hospitals have been routinely hit.
Health officials and humanitarian aid workers have been killed, including two Save the Children staff members in the now infamous “Christmas Eve Massacre” in which 38 people were bound, gagged and reportedly burnt alive.
The open letter to Min Aung Hlaing concludes with a warning to the Myanmar dictator. “You are a wanted man, wanted for mass murder. We will not rest until you are imprisoned under a life sentence. We will continue to pursue justice against you until your dying day.”
Ends
Note to editors: On 1 February 2022 at 1400, a protest rally will be held outside the Myanmar Embassy, 19a Charles Street, London, W1J 5DX. Hundreds of people are expected to attend. Charms representing those who have been killed by the junta will be pinned to a wall. Chris Gunness will deliver the open letter and be available there for interview. We will also make available a broadcast quality version of the animations by Yoni Goodman. For further information please mail cgunness@outlook.org.