Insight Myanmar
“It is an extraordinarily fascinating country in and of itself,” says veteran journalist and human rights advocate Chris Gunness, about his lifelong connection to Myanmar, first as a journalist and then as head of an organization dedicated to pursuing justice for victims of government atrocities. As Gunness goes on to tell, his background with the country is anything but a new endeavor.
As a young BBC reporter many decades ago, he followed events in the country from afar in London in the mid-1980s; he saw a nation shaped by unresolved legacies of British rule, deep ethnic fragmentation and decades of civil war, yet so closed that even major crises passed without international notice. He calls the Myanmar of that time an “information black hole.” The country’s political complexity— while being largely ignored by the rest of the world— intrigued him as a journalist. By 1986, Myanmar had become the focus of his reporting, and he began tracking the country’s growing economic and political instability.
By late 1987, Myanmar reached a breaking point. General Ne Win abruptly demonetized several major currency notes, wiping out people’s life savings overnight. Anger spread quickly. For the first time in decades, murmurs of spontaneous protest began circulating openly, as public discontent swelled to its highest levels since Ne Win’s 1962 coup cemented military rule.
Small clashes soon escalated into violence near Rangoon University, and the regime crushed the unrest with familiar brutality. Diplomatic circles in Yangon began whispering that Ne Win might finally resign, and many sensed that something irreversible had begun. Among them was Chris Gunness. His BBC editor, Nick Nugent, urged him to get into the country fast—even if it meant entering under tourist cover. It was the only way any reporter could hope to witness what was unfolding behind Myanmar’s sealed borders.
Gunness arrived with a seven-day visa, intending only to observe quietly. But within twenty-four hours, Ne Win suddenly announced his resignation on state television, promising multiparty politics and economic reform. The Cold War’s rigid alignments appeared to be shifting in Southeast Asia—this was years before similar changes occurred in Europe. Nugent instructed Gunness to break cover and begin filing reports openly, despite his inexperience. Gunness remembers the mixture of fear and duty as he delivered his first on-the-record dispatch from a dilapidated hotel. As far as he knows, no other foreign journalists were present at that time.
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