“If we fail, we won’t be able to go back home,” she said in a Facebook post. “But we cannot carry out their work.”
At an apartment in Berlin, former Myanmar consular officer Chaw Kalyar raises the three-finger salute, a gesture from the "Hunger Games" films that has become the symbol of Asia's new pro-democracy forces. Photo: Verena Hölzl
This screengrab of handout video shows Myanmar's ambassador to the UN Kyaw Moe Tun making a three-finger salute as he addresses an informal meeting of the United Nations General Assembly on Feb. 26, 2021 in New York. Photo: United Nations / AFP
While she says her colleagues who remained at the embassy mostly support the ousted civilian government, Chaw and the two others who walked out with her are in a precarious situation. They might lose their apartments, their visas and their diplomatic passports, which depend on the support of the regime in power. At home, the military is resorting to increasingly brutal tactics against protesters. More than 2,600 people have been detained and at least 260 killed since the coup, according to local advocacy group the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners. International condemnation and sanctions don’t seem to be having any effect on the generals, who claim they seized power and arrested civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi because of alleged election fraud in November in which military-backed parties were trounced at the polls.“At least in Germany, we don’t have to be scared of being dragged out of our apartments at night.”
It’s also not her first revolution. In 1988, when the people took to the streets and thousands lost their lives in the fight against the then-military regime, Chaw joined the struggle. She was 16 years old. Many of her friends died or fled to the jungle.Ten years, a journey through a broken education system and various random jobs later, hopes for the revolution fizzled and she decided to join the Foreign Ministry in the late 1990s, when it was still under control of then-junta leader Than Shwe.But after the transition to democracy in 2011, she is not willing to turn back the clock. “This time, everyone has witnessed what they did. They cannot run this country anymore,” she said.Chaw says she would support any means possible to overthrow the junta. “If we give in to the military, it’s the worst scenario for all of us.”“Talking to the military is like playing the harp to a buffalo. They never listen to anyone.”