Freedom Blues

The previous authoritarian government exercised the same policy, according to Khun Saing, a former final year medical student who has been arrested three times since the 1970s. After his first release in 1978, he was barred from completing his degree.

“That changed my life,” said 53 year-old Khun Saing, who settled in the Thai-Burmese border area early this year. “That’s one of the factors that makes former political prisoners depressed since they can’t continue their intended career.”

In a practical effort to help released prisoners, the AAPP published a handbook in August 2005, taken from a larger publication, Counselling Torture Survivors, by Allan and Mia Staehr for the International Rehabilitation Council for Torture Victims, in Copenhagen. The 67-page AAPP booklet relates the experiences of former political prisoners in both Burma and South Africa and includes advice from a counselor.

Bo Kyi, who translated part of the book, said the publication would help former political prisoners, their families and society in general, confront the problems faced by released political prisoners.

Burma has some 1,200 political prisoners, he said. “We, our society, have to seriously think of their life after prison. We need to rehabilitate them so that they can contribute their efforts and talents in building the country,”

But the problem is really much larger, according to Bo Kyi. “Burma as a whole needs to be rehabilitated socially, economically, politically and spiritually.”