8-8-88 Archive
By THE IRRAWADDY

Across Burma many students, workers, artists and even bureaucrats took to the streets to demonstrate against the government in August and September 1988, but not all of them returned home.

While several participants fled to the jungles or were sent to prison, others disappeared leaving family members and friends with the pain of unanswered questions about their fate.

Government attempts to bury the past have made it all the more difficult to piece together clues as to the whereabouts of many. The bodies of wounded protesters were buried or cremated en masse with no record of their identity. Furthermore, records of the events were suppressed in an attempt to white-wash history.

The story behind the list featured on the page illustrates the difficulties of preserving the truth. The lists were written by an unknown medical student serving as an orderly in Rangoon General Hospital from August 7-17. Look at: http://www.irrawaddy.org/research_show.php?art_id=441

A complete transcription of this set of notes, and of another complied in Sagaing by the Rangoon Bar Council, is posted on our website: http://www.irrawaddy.org/research_show.php?art_id=3531.
 
However, the record of the Sagaing massacre is incomplete. Both lists were smuggled out of Burma after the September coup when it became dangerous to have such documents, and are now in the possession of journalist Bertil Lintner, author of Outrage, an exhaustively researched account of the events of 1988.

Other similar documents have been lost, destroyed or kept secret for political reasons. Many Burmese have records, but don’t know what to do with them of where to send them.

Furthermore, records held by Rangoon-based embassies and foreign media groups have been kept from the public for fear that their release would damage relations with the regime.

Announcing an 8-8-88 Archive

We have begun an archive to collect information on those killed, wounded or missing from the massacre of 1988. Our intention is to preserve these documents, so that they do not disappear. If you have any relevant information please contact us at comments@irrawaddy.org or by post P.O. Box 242, Chiang Mai University Post Office, Chiang Mai, 50202, Thailand.

(This article appeared in the August, 2000 issue of The Irrawaddy.)