PRESS RELEASE                                                                                             August 8,1996

August 8 marks the eight anniversary of general strike that led to a military takeover of the government of Burma.  On August 8, 1988 throngs of  Burmese first took to the streets in support of democracy.  After more than a month of peaceful demonstrations, a military coup on September 18 put a stop to the democracy movement. Calling themselves the State Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC), the military Junta ordered the killing of thousands of civilians.  Thousands more were arrested, tortured, raped, and detained without trial.  Many others fled to malarial jungles along the border with Thailand.

 During the following eight years human rights abuses have escalated, according to the United Nations Human Rights Commission.  Amnesty International and other advocates for human rights have been especially critical of the forced labor and forced location of thousands of Mons and other ethnic nationalities through  whose ancestral lands oil  companies  Unocal  (US) and Total (French) are building a natural gas pipeline.  

 On June 29, 1995, the ethnic Mon armed opposition, New Mon State Party (NMSP) signed a cease-fire deal with the SLORC. Even though the cease-fire agreement was signed between SLORC and MNSP,  tortures, rapes and murders by SLORC's soldiers still increase in Monland. We believe this cease-fire agreement cannot protect Mon people from the SLORC oppression.

 Last April Mon refugees were forcibly repatriated into Burma soil  as marking the repatriation against their own desires.  We also believe that it is not safe for  repatriation of Mon refugees while human rights abuses still increase in  Monland and  while new arrivals from several local Mon villages have continously come and looked  for a safe haven in Halockhani camp.    It   should repatriate Mon refugees only after peace and democracy are restored in Burma. 

Citing the increasing reports of forced labor, torture, rape, and murder in Burma,  the Monland Restoration Council is marking  the anniversary of the first demonstrations by calling on US government and the international community to:

1.  Impose a total economic sanction on Burma.

 2.  Protect  Mon refugees from "forced repatriation."

  3.  Urge Burma's military rulers to immediately release all political prisoners and to begin negotiations with representatives of the NLD and ethnic nationalities.

                                                                                                Central Committee

                                                                                        Monland Restoration Council.