Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
May 2002 and 30 May 2003), she would spend the next decade shut away from the pub-
lic.
Than Shwe: Unmasking Burma's Tyrant
by Benedict Rogers is an unauthorised bio-
graphy of the secretive senior general who, many believe, still calls the shots in Myan-
mar.
Than Shwe Takes Over
Due to the tourism boycott launched by the NLD and others there was a disappointing
turnout for the junta's official 'Visit Myanmar Year 1996'. Increased sanctions from the
West led the government to seek other sources of income: namely from trade with China,
India and Thailand.
Khin Nyunt, feared head of military intelligence, became Prime Minister in 2003. The
man known as the Prince of Darkness took the lead on the junta's seven-step 'roadmap
towards discipline-flourishing democracy'. But only a year later hard-liner Senior Gener-
al Than Shwe ousted Khin Nyunt and many of his fellow intelligence officers; at a secret
trial Khin Nyunt was sentenced to 44 years in jail.
Than Shwe initially promised to continue the transition to democracy, but instead his
activity showed a focus on negotiating multimillion- dollar trade deals with China, India
and Thailand, and importing weapons and military know-how from Russia and North
Korea.
In 2005 an entirely new capital city was created in the arid fields near Pyinmana. The
junta named the city-in-the-making Nay Pyi Taw (Royal Capital), leaving little doubt
that Than Shwe's strategies and inspirations were aligned less with the modern world
than with Burmese kings of centuries past.
Karma can come around for Myanmar's former rulers. Ne Win died, disgraced and living
in obscurity, in 2002. His protégé Khin Nyunt was charged with corruption and placed
under house arrest until January 2012 when released as part of the amnesty on political
prisoners; he now runs a gallery in Yangon.
The 'Saffron Revolution'
In mid-2007 natural gas prices rose by 500% (and petrol by 200%), leading to price hikes
for everything from local bus tickets to rice. In late August a group of '1988 generation'
protestors were arrested for staging a march against the inflation. On 5 September, when
