Suu Kyi's determination to peacefully defy dictatorship remains unchanged

I'm moved to tear several times while editing this column in the morning.
This is also one of the finest columns I've ever read in my life, being edited by an editor with Mainichi Shimbun.
I'm deeply moved.
(srachai)
編集していて何度も涙をこぼしました。
毎日新聞が記者の足を駆使して作成した力作です。
感動しました。
（スラチャイ記）

(Mainichi Japan) February 24, 2011
Suu Kyi's determination to peacefully defy dictatorship remains unchanged
記者の目：スーチーさんの「手紙」１３年ぶり再会＝朴鐘珠

The Mainichi Shimbun resumed Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi's column, "Letter from Burma," this year after a 13-year break. I flew to Myanmar where press restrains were in force late last year and visited Suu Kyi's residence prior to the publication of the first part of the column on New Year's Day.
　ミャンマーの民主化運動指導者、アウンサンスーチーさん（６５）による本紙連載「ビルマからの手紙」を１３年ぶりに再開した。元日からの掲載に先立ち私は昨年末、取材規制のかけられたミャンマーに入国し、スーチーさんの自宅を訪ねた。

Suu Kyi had been under house arrest there on and off over a 15-year period from 1989 to November last year. I stood by one of the windows of her residence, and thought about how firm her determination must be to spend her life resisting Myanmar's military dictatorship.
そこは彼女が８９年から昨年１１月まで断続的に１５年軟禁されていた場所だ。私は窓辺に立ち、人生を賭したスーチーさんの覚悟の深さに思いを巡らせた。

　◇昨秋に軟禁解除、弾圧構造は不変
The military dictatorship has been in power in Myanmar for nearly half a century since the 1962 coup. Suu Kyi founded the National League for Democracy (NLD) in 1988 in a bid to democratize the country, and the party secured 82 percent of the seats in Parliament in a 1990 general election. Nevertheless, the military regime refused to hand over power to the NLD and suppressed pro-democracy movements.
The military regime has continued a reign of terror, detaining and torturing NLD members and supporters. Last autumn, the regime called a general election and released Suu Kyi from house arrest. However, the shift to civilian rule was a mirage and the military is still ruling the country.
　ミャンマーでは１９６２年のクーデターから半世紀近く、軍事独裁政権が続いている。民主主義国家の実現を目指すスーチーさんは８８年に国民民主連盟（ＮＬＤ）を結党、９０年の総選挙で全議席の８２％を獲得した。しかし軍政は政権移譲に応じず民主化運動を弾圧、ＮＬＤ党員や支持者を拘禁・拷問する恐怖政治を敷いてきた。昨秋以降の総選挙とスーチーさんの軟禁解除、形だけの民政移管後も、軍政の支配構造は変わらない。

Suu Kyi's residence is situated in Yangon, the largest city in Myanmar. Since its gate is higher than an adult's average height, it is impossible to look into her home from the street. There is no other house nearby, and since security forces are surrounding her home round the clock, ordinary citizens are reluctant to approach her house out of fear that security authorities might suspect they have ties to Suu Kyi.
　スーチーさんの自宅は、国内最大都市のヤンゴンにある。門扉が大人の背丈よりも高いため、表通りから中をうかがうことはできない。近隣に民家がなく、何より治安当局が周囲を取り巻き２４時間監視しているので、一般市民は関係を疑われるのを恐れて近づきたがらない。

Her house is a western-style two-story building with white walls, and security authorities set up a fence with barbed wire behind her home facing a lake. When I saw a scene at the lakeside while waiting for her to return home, I could hardly believe my eyes. There, dozens of couples were dating while people with children were taking a walk. A promenade leads to an amusement park and a Ferris wheel towers over trees.
　自宅は２階建ての白壁の洋館で、湖に面した裏手には当局によって有刺鉄線が張られていた。彼女の帰宅を待ちながら窓辺に立ち、格子の間から見えた景色に目を疑った。くるりと弧を描いた湖畔の芝生で、何十組ものカップルが肩を寄せ合い、その間を親子連れが散歩している。遊歩道の先には遊園地があり、緑の木々の上に観覧車のてっぺんが頭を出していた。

A place isolated from the outside world and a place where citizens lead their daily lives coexist there -- a ruthless reality.
　同じ湖のほとりに、外界から孤立した空間と、市民の日常とが隣り合わせる非情な現実があった。

Suu Kyi, who was separated from her family because of her house arrest, has never lost courage even though she regularly sees citizens nearby who appear happy, and instead tolerates her solitary life. She has reasons for having to do so.
軟禁によって家族と引き裂かれたスーチーさんはしかし、手の届きそうなところにあふれる平凡な幸せにも心を折られることなく、孤独な時間を耐え抜いた。彼女には、そうしなければならない理由があった。

Suu Kyi lost her husband, who had been battling cancer in Britain, in 1999 while she was under house arrest. Feeling that he was close to the end of his life, he applied for a visa to visit Myanmar to meet his wife, only to be rejected. The military regime hoped that Suu Kyi would leave for Britain to meet with her ailing husband. However, she chose to stay home because there was no guarantee that she would be allowed to come back to Myanmar once she left the country. She chose to prioritize her pro-democracy movement rather than stay with her dying husband. Her determination is undoubtedly attributable to the existence of fellow freedom fighters imprisoned as political prisoners.
　スーチーさんは軟禁解除中の９９年、英国で闘病していた夫をがんで亡くしている。死期が迫り、夫はミャンマーへの入国ビザを申請したが却下された。軍政側はこれを機にスーチーさんが英国へ出国してくれることを期待したが、一度祖国を離れれば再入国できる保証はない。彼女は国内にとどまった。最愛の人の死に立ち会うより民主化運動を優先した決意。彼女にそこまで腹をくくらせたものは、政治犯として獄中につながれた仲間の存在に違いない。

In December 1995, shortly after she started the column in the Mainichi Shimbun, Suu Kyi told the world political prisoners were barred from meeting their children for over two years and that their family members were being interrogated and harassed.
　最初にスーチーさんの「手紙」の連載を初めて間もない９５年１２月、彼女は「籠の外の若い鳥」と題し、政治犯の子が親との面会を２年以上も許可されず、また家族が当局から尋問や嫌がらせを受けている窮状を訴えた。

Her message that she was not the only Myanmar woman detained for her political thoughts appears to reflect a kind of guilty feeling she harbors toward other people who were being suppressed by the military regime.
「私は、政治のために拘置されたビルマ唯一の女性ではない」という一文に、弾圧される人々への、ある種の後ろめたさがにじむ。

There is a special reason why Suu Kyi evaded being tortured or imprisoned even though she is the leader of Myanmar's pro-democracy movement. Her father played a leading role in winning Myanmar's independence and she is well-known to the world as a Nobel Peace Prize laureate. The military regime cannot simply take her away from society.
民主化運動の“首謀者”である彼女が拷問や投獄を免れたのには、特別な事情がある。父がビルマ独立運動に献身した将軍という血筋と、ノーベル平和賞を受賞した国際的知名度。軍政とて彼女を他の名もなき政治犯のように、いきなり表社会から消し去るようなまねはできない。

　◇無名の政治犯に思いを寄せ続け
In other words, Suu Kyi is a pro-democracy activist whose safety is guaranteed. Therefore, she is obviously determined to share the pain imposed on her fellow pro-democracy activists. In the second letter of the current series that ran on Feb. 6, she confessed that she made a habit of having breakfast quite late during her house arrest "so that in my hunger I would not forget our comrades who were incarcerated not in their own homes but in prisons, often in places far distant from where their families live."
　誤解を恐れずに言えば、彼女はミャンマーで最も身の安全を保障された民主化運動家である。だからこそ、仲間が強いられた痛みを率先して共有することを自らに課しているのだろう。連載再開２通目の手紙（２月６日朝刊）で彼女は、軟禁中に朝食の時間を遅らせていたことを明かした。「自らを空腹にすることで、刑務所に投獄され、家族から引き離されている同志を忘れないため」と記している。

I have met various people as a journalist, but I clearly remember I felt tense when I first met Suu Kyi. The feeling derived from my sense of reverence -- similar to a feeling I harbored toward citizens who repeatedly staged a sit-in protest in the Henoko district of Nago, Okinawa Prefecture, to express opposition to the relocation of a U.S. base to the area and those who were involved in a signature-collecting campaign against a so-called plutonium-thermal power generation project. They are determined to confront political power without resorting to violence.
　私はこれまで記者としてさまざまな人と接してきたが、スーチーさんと向き合った時に感じた緊張には覚えがある。沖縄で米軍基地の移設を許さず辺野古の浜で座り込みを続ける人々や、佐賀で原発のプルサーマル発電に異を唱え署名を集めていた人々にも抱いた、非暴力不服従で権力に対峙（たいじ）する覚悟への、畏敬（いけい）の念だ。

I asked Suu Kyi, a Japanophile who studied at Kyoto University in the 1980s, what she expects Japan to do for the democratization of Myanmar. Instead of answering my question, she asked me whether I, as a Japanese national, have urged the Japanese government to pressure Myanmar's military regime to release all political prisoners. I couldn't nod with confidence to Suu Kyi, who shot a questioning glance at me. (By Pak Chong-chu, Foreign News Department)
　８０年代に京都大へ留学した親日家でもあるスーチーさんに、ミャンマー民主化のため日本に期待することを尋ねたところ、「日本人なら当然、軍政に政治犯を釈放させるよう、自国の政府に働きかけているでしょう？」と逆に質問された。日本の覚悟を推し量ろうとするような彼女の瞳に自信を持ってうなずくことができなかった。（外信部）

毎日新聞　2011年2月24日　0時12分