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Refugees rise in Kachin, Shan states due to clashes

January 9, 2018/in News

THE number of people displaced in the escalating clashes between government forces and ethnic armed groups in Shan and Kachin states rose to 1200, aid officials said Thursday. Some 1100 people from Kaing Tine, Kyaukphyu Lay, Ar Pyaung and Hgin Gar villages fled to Kyaukme city due to fighting between Tatmadaw and Ta’aung (Palaung) National Liberation […]

Ex-Political Prisoner Makes Art From Plastic Refuse

January 8, 2018/in News

By KYAW PHYO THA 5 January 2018 Shortly before daybreak on the last day of 2017, San Zaw Htway, a Myanmar artist famous for his collages made from recycled plastic bags and also a former political prisoner, succumbed to a liver ailment in a Yangon hospital. Known for his humility and the promotion of his collage techniques […]

Refugees rise in Kachin, Shan states due to clashes

January 9, 2018/in News

Ex-Political Prisoner Makes Art From Plastic Refuse

January 8, 2018/in News

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Refugees rise in Kachin, Shan states due to clashes

January 9, 2018/in News

THE number of people displaced in the escalating clashes between government forces and ethnic armed groups in Shan and Kachin states rose to 1200, aid officials said Thursday.

Some 1100 people from Kaing Tine, Kyaukphyu Lay, Ar Pyaung and Hgin Gar villages fled to Kyaukme city due to fighting between Tatmadaw and Ta’aung (Palaung) National Liberation Army (TNLA) in northern Shan State’s Kyaukme and Namsan townships, according to Shan State Department of Relief and Resettlement Director U Soe Naing.

He said the displaced people from the clashes which began since the last week of December, have currently taken refuge at Warso Monastery, Aung Mingalar Monastery, No.3 Dhamaryone Sakan and Aung Myae Thar Yar Monastery.

“At present, we have provided them with basic necessities such as food and clothing,” U Soe Naing said.

Department officials will meet the displaced people who have taken refuge in Kyaukme to provide more food, he said, adding that his office will cooperate with local civil society groups and Red Cross in helping villagers who want to evacuate from their homes.

“We are directly giving aid to refugees in the areas in Northern Shan State which are under the government’s control,” said Union Minister for Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement Dr Win Myat Aye.

“Through negotiation with respective organisations, we have also provided for those who have fled to the areas beyond the government’s control,” he added.

Villagers feared that fights would intensify so they began fleeing from their villages since December 29, said U Thar Zaw, a relief worker.

Most of the refugees are women and children, and they still need blankets, pillows and food, said U Tin Maung Thein, a spokesperson for Zewita, a social welfare association in Kyaukme.

Tatmadaw and TNLA fought throughout December in Kutkai, Mong Ton, Muse, Mong Ko, Kyaukme and Namsan townships.

In the adjacent Kachin State, government forces — locally known as Tatmadaw — and the state’s ethnic armed group Kachin Independence Army (KIA) have also clashed in Mansi township, displacing 100 villagers, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) figures released on January 1.

“There was fierce fighting last month in Manwynegyi village. Villagers fled as the planes fired. It is calm now and we will have to arrange for them to go back,” Mansi township MP for State Hluttaw U Min Min said.

Dr Win Myat Aye said that the government can only extend immediate help to those refugees in government controlled areas.

“If refugees enter government-controlled areas, we will provide assistance. We are providing vocational training at IDP camps and arranging everything for them including healthcare,” he said.

Fighting between Tatmadaw and KIA stared in mid-December in Laiza, Hpakant, Tanai and Mansi, and the situation in these areas remains tense.

Myanmar Times

Ex-Political Prisoner Makes Art From Plastic Refuse

January 8, 2018/in News

By KYAW PHYO THA 5 January 2018

Shortly before daybreak on the last day of 2017, San Zaw Htway, a Myanmar artist famous for his collages made from recycled plastic bags and also a former political prisoner, succumbed to a liver ailment in a Yangon hospital. Known for his humility and the promotion of his collage techniques among children, including those in internally displaced person camps, the 44-year-old had been diagnosed with advanced liver cancer brought on by the dire prison conditions he endured as a political prisoner and poor healthcare following his release. Here is his profile, published in the October 2014 edition of the Irrawaddy Magazine.

YANGON — Give him plastic bags of any color, and this former political prisoner will turn them into a work of art.

Instead of acrylic paint and brushes, San Zaw Htway opts to work with not only plastic bags, but also cardboard, instant coffee packets and other recycled goods. He taught himself to make painting-like collages with these materials while he was serving time under the former military regime.

“They’re all I need,” boasted the 40-year-old, pointing to scissors and adhesive containers littered across the floor of his studio in Rangoon. In one corner of the second-floor studio sits of a pile of smoothed plastic wrappings that otherwise would have been destined for a garbage can.

The article ‘From Plastic, Ex-political Prisoner Makes Art’ as it appeared in The Irrawaddy Magazine’s October 2014 issue.

Since his release from prison in 2012, San Zaw Htway has held five solo shows in Burma, in addition to teaching his collage techniques to orphans and children living with HIV.

Now his work is gaining international attention. He has been shortlisted for the 2014 Artraker Award, which recognizes artists who are making a difference in highly challenging environments. The works of 12 candidates from 10 countries, including Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, will be exhibited from Sept. 18-25 at London’s a/political gallery.

“Being shortlisted means a lot to me because recycled collage art is still not well embraced in Burma,” said San Zaw Htway at his home, while preparing for his trip to the capital of England.

A collage by San Zaw Htway.(Photo: The Irrawaddy)

“Despite my access to paint and brushes now, I still stick to recycled collage art because it’s environmentally sustainable and I want the art trend to develop in Burma,” he added.

Painting was a childhood hobby for San Zaw Htway. When he was sentenced to 36 years in prison for his anti-government political activities in 1999, he was only a college freshman majoring in history. He spent 13 years in prison, during which time he was put in solitary confinement and he went on hunger strikes.

Burmese prisons are notorious for their squalid conditions and restrictions on prisoners’ rights, with even reading and writing prohibited. San Zaw Htaw said he saw art as a way to defy prison authorities. “I intentionally did it to show them that they can’t control everything in our lives,” he said. “But the problem was how to make it happen, since painting materials were not allowed.”

The student activist decided to make collages with materials within his reach. When his family sent him foods wrapped in plastic bags, he turned the bags into a canvas on which he plastered colorful cuttings from instant coffee packets and shampoo sachets. He scavenged prison garbage cans for plastic sheets in colors that caught his eye. He washed them, smoothed them out and applied them onto the makeshift canvas with the help of a smuggled scissor and glue.

Working late at night under the faint glow of a light bulb that dangled on the ceiling of the corridor outside his cell, he was careful to hide his work from prison authorities, taking days to finish a single collage. He produced portraits of Burmese democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi and collages of peacocks, the emblem of Burmese student and democracy movements. Some of his works reflected his longing for freedom, including “Blue Moon on the Highway,” one the three collages that have been chosen for the exhibition in London.

“I was lying awake one night in 2009 and I heard the occasional swishes of buses on the highway outside the prison. I felt a surge of longing to be on one of those buses, so I poured out my feeling onto the collage,” he said.

Htein Lin, a prominent Burmese contemporary artist and another former political prisoner, said San Zaw Htway’s nomination for the Artraker Award and his participation in the exhibition would be a source of pride for Burmese artists and their country.

“I like his recycled artwork, not only for its promotion of environmental sustainability, but also for its reflection of an important message behind all forms of prison artwork: You can lock up our bodies, but not our emotions and our creativity,” he said.

Apart from being a collage artist, San Zaw Htway is a counselor for former political prisoners and their families. Earlier this year he joined a training program—organized by the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma) with support from Johns Hopkins University—and now he offers counseling sessions five days per week.

“As a former political prisoner myself, I know very well to what extent we and our families have been mentally affected by what we faced for years. Counseling is one of the best ways to cure their traumas,” he said.

When asked how he felt to be participating in the exhibition in London, he said he was happy.

“My prison experience has taught me that no matter how dire the situation is, there is a way to achieve what you want to do,” he said. “That is my message to anyone who sees my art.”

The Irrawaddy News

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ND Burma

ND-Burma formed in 2004 in order to provide a way for Burma human rights organizations to collaborate on the human rights documentation process. The 13 ND-Burma member organizations seek to collectively use the truth of what communities in Burma have endured to advocate for justice for victims. ND-Burma trains local organizations in human rights documentation; coordinates members’ input into a common database using Martus, a secure open-source software; and engages in joint-advocacy campaigns.

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