Naing Ko Ko was forced to behave like a dog. Photo / Paul Escourt
A Burmese democracy activist forced to live like a dog for six months wants tourists to boycott Burma because their dollars fund the military regime that jailed him.
Naing Ko Ko, 35, was given residence in New Zealand in December after Council of Trade Unions leader Ross Wilson
asked Prime Minister Helen Clark for a letter to rescue him from detention in Thailand.
He will speak at three screenings of a film about forced labour in Burma at the Human Rights Film Festival, which opens in Auckland today.
He was forced to live like a dog after he was jailed in Rangoon's infamous Insein Prison in 1992 because of involvement in the student-based democracy movement when he was at university.
"Every political prisoner has to behave as a dog," he said. "When the guards talk to you, you have to bark and say, 'Woof, woof.' You can't reply 'Yes' and 'No', you have to say, 'Woof, woof."'
His food was placed on the floor and he had to go down on his hands and knees and eat it like a dog, without using his hands or utensils.
When he was finally released in 1998, he and his mother had to sign bonds stating he would not take part in political activities. But he escaped to Thailand and joined other exiled activists.
He will speak this week at screenings of Total Denial, a film by Bulgarian director Milena Kaneva about a natural gas pipeline built with forced labour by French oil company Total and US company Unocal from Burma to Thailand, which led to a legal challenge in the US courts.
Fifteen villagers forced to work on the project without pay were awarded US$28 million ($37.7 million) in compensation - US$10 million for themselves and the rest for development in the affected area.
As international campaign secretary for the exiled Federation of Trade Unions of Burma, Mr Naing said all multinationals operating in the country, and tourists visiting there, effectively funded guns for the military Government.
Even a New Zealand Aid project spending $500,000 over three years to provide small-scale irrigation was helping the regime.
