BURMA: REFERENDUM AND REPRESSION

24 Apr 08 | News and features

U Attira accepts Index Award
Last Monday, Index on Censorship honoured Burma’s monks for their struggle against the ruling junta. The military regime is now cracking down on dissent as it pushes through a new constitution, writes David Jardine

Burma’s brutal ruling military junta will stage a national referendum on 10 May to rubber stamp a Potemkin constitution that will give the armed forces a guaranteed 25 per cent of seats in the national assembly.

The crucial home affairs ministry will remain in the hands of the junta, thus securing for it permanent control of the media.

The junta, led by General Than Shwe, is boastfully confident that it will secure the Yes vote that the all-out propaganda campaign of the state-controlled media is demanding. Anyone campaigning for a No vote faces arrest and almost certainly a long term of imprisonment in one or other part of the junta’s gulag, including the much hated Insein prison in Rangoon.

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Francisco Goldman accepts Index on Censorship TR Fyvel Book Award

23 Apr 08 | Comment

Francisco Goldman accepts the Index on Censorship TR Fyvel Book Award for his work, The Art of Political Murder: Who killed Bishop Gerardi?. The culmination of years of investigative journalism, The Art of the Political Murder is an astonishing account of the search for the killers of Guatemalan bishop Juan Gerardi. The book has made a huge impact in Guatamela, even majorly influencing the result of the recent presidential election.