Forced to Flee: Burmese Refugee's Story

LONDON, Sept. 25, 2007 — -- At just 14 years old, Zoya Phan was forced to flee her village in eastern Burma. Arriving at the Thai-Burma border, she was imprisoned in a camp. With little food and medicine most of her family did what they could to survive.

They endured life in the camps, but Zoya's mother did not. She suffered a heart attack, and because of the lack of provisions, she died.

Zoya managed to seek asylum here three years ago. Today Zoya is a campaign officer at the Burma Campaign U.K. She sat down with us to talk about the recent protests taking place in her country.

Why are the monks taking part in the protests?

Zoya Phan: "These protests have been going on for more than a month and they are so significant because this time the monks are leading the demonstration. Under the monks' leadership, people, civilians and celebrities, artists and different parts of societies in Burma all joined together with one voice in solidarity, demanding change against the military dictatorship in Burma."

Civilians are protected by the monks?

Zoya Phan: "Yeah, well, in Burma, monks are considered respectful people. They have moral high authority over civilians and also to some extent influence on the military generals and because this time the monks have principles when they lead a demonstration like it must be peaceful protest, it must not break the law and demanding for the goal that will aim to change in Burma. They are calling for peace; they are calling for national reconciliation. They are calling for the release of political prisoners."

So far the protests have been peaceful. We've just heard that riot police have moved in. Are we expecting scenes like we saw in 1988?

Zoya Phan: "Like we just said, so far we have seen peaceful protests. There are some crackdowns by the regimes. They've been arresting more than 150 people and we don't know where these people are kept but we can imagine how badly they would be tortured. And this protest, the regime, has not started any violence in response yet but this is likely to happen in the near future, because as the number of the civilians joining the protest increases and as it gets bigger and bigger the chance of a violent response from the regime is also getting bigger.