Episode #212: Sean Turnell
From academic to government advisor to political prisoner, Sean Turnell has been deeply involved in Myanmar’s evolving story for over three decades. Much of this personal story is told in his recent book, An Unlikely Prisoner: How an eternal optimist found hope in Myanmar’s most notorious jail, which is the basis for today’s discussion. This is our second interview with Turnell, and listeners are encouraged to check out his earlier discussion that focused on the country’s financial landscape.
Turnell’s Myanmar journey was initially sparked by a Burmese housemate in Australia who was involved in the democracy movement. It then took a deeper turn through his work as an economist working with Australia’s Central Bank. “And then gradually, little by little, I got pulled deeper and deeper into the Myanmar universe.” This led to his 2009 book, Fiery Dragons: Banks, Moneylenders, and Microfinance in Burma, which he notes was “a critique of the economy as it existed in the early 2000s. But it required me to go deep into Burmese history, and that's really where I fell in love with the place.” Taking ten years to write and requiring visits to the various archives located around the world, his book affirmed a deeply held belief that for “economics to be done properly, it needs to be rooted in national institutions, which in turn requires knowledge of history and culture, and all the aspects that actually make for a modern economy. I've actually been an economist who has long been critical of the narrowness of my own discipline, as economics has gotten narrower and narrower, and more and more mathematical, and sort of lost the plot.” Turnell’s research for Fiery Dragons helped him understand to what extent the many years of failed Burmese leadership had doomed generation after generation, and instilled in him a sense of purpose to do what he could to help change this negative trajectory.
His research on Fiery Dragons, and his subsequent interviews on BBC, eventually caught the attention of Aung San Suu Kyi, who was still under house arrest at the time. She began a written correspondence with him. When Turnell eventually got to meet her, he was quite impressed by her character, describing her as “a sort of English schoolmistress. She's very proper, exceedingly bright, and not given to sort of mindless small talk.” When the NLD was voted into power in 2015, Turnell was brought on as an economic advisor, and notes that two things in particular kept him up at night: first, the constant danger of a military coup, and second, a looming banking crisis. “I suspect not even one bank was solvent with the application of proper accounting standards,” he says, describing how a collapse of the banking system would have totally crippled the NLD ‘s attempts at reform.
Even worse, most Burmese banks were fronts for massive criminal enterprises and illicit activity. “Even from the get-go, you don't really want to lift too many rocks when it comes to the banks,” he admits, adding that he even received personal threats regarding the banking regulations he was trying to implement. The emerging Rohingya crisis during his tenure added a further layer of complexity, and horror, so much so that Turnell thought long and hard about resigning. Instead, he decided to stay and do what he could to advocate for change from within the system, for example, writing a memorandum that proposed internal sanctions on the military for their human rights violations in Rakhine state. Turnell also adds that while he might not have foreseen the specific nature of the Rohingya crisis, “the idea that the military would do something to try and bring the civilian government down and to tarnish the international reputation of Daw Su and the NLD was something we absolutely expected.” This also plays into how he sees Aung San Suu Kyi’s infamous, fateful decision to go to the International Court of Justice: because she and her supporters were so fearful of an imminent military coup, they had to walk a tightrope trying to appease the military while pursuing reforms.
All this leads up to the military takeover on February 1st, 2021. Turnell feels the military’s decision was directly inspired by Donald Trump’s false claim challenging the American elections, and the related, January 6th insurrection. Talks were held between NLD leaders and senior military officials to avert a takeover, but they had broken down in the days prior. Yet Turnell still did not suspect a coup was imminent, and remained at his Yangon hotel following covid quarantine procedures. But early in the morning on February 6th, the military came for him, and Turnell would not be a free man for the next 650 days.
The official rationale behind Turnell’s imprisonment was that he had violated the Official Secrets Act, a colonial-era law that the junta used to paint him as a spy having access to classified documents. But the unfolding of the state’s case against him turned into a Kafkaesque masquerade: clumsily modifying the documents found on Turnell’s devices by adding a clearly fraudulent “Top Secret” mark; a witness— who later admitted to not speaking a word of English—testifying about a long conversation he’d had with Turnell…in English; accusing him of possessing a “confidential” document that he himself was the author of (the aforementioned memorandum on internal military sanctions). It was hard to even follow the logic of the regime’s argument at times. Further heightening the absurdity was that the hearings were not held in formal colonial-era courts, but at “the quasi-ornate houses previously used for deputy ministers.” And then there were the frequent, unpredictable power cuts would routinely stop proceedings for hours at a time (a topic that former energy advisor Guillaume de Langre addressed in a previous episode).
Turnell spent his first two months of confinement in what he called “The Box”: a windowless, claustrophobic, unbearably hot room where he was subjected to near constant interrogation. “It was just a really horrifying experience,” he recalls. “The psychological tension is building all the time, particularly because at first the interrogators didn't seem to ask anything sensible, it was all just to try to discombobulate me and make me nervous and reduce my morale.”
He was then transferred to the notorious Insein Prison, but the conditions weren’t any better there. “It was a complete and utter horror,” he describes, likening it to a medieval dungeon. “Just seeing that that old guard house which of course is deliberately built to intimidate.” A passionate Lord of the Rings fan, he could only compare it to something Tolkien would have described as existing in the depths of Mordor. All the more distressing—and baffling—were the heavy iron shackles that Turnell was often burdened with. As a lifelong academic with a slight frame, his continual insistence that he could not possibly be a danger fell on deaf ears.
But Turnell soon fell into the rhythms of daily life behind bars. While past guests such as Swe Win, Ma Thida, Linn Thant, Liv Gaborit, and Delphine Schrank talked about meditation as a critical tool that kept Burmese inmates sane and balanced through such difficult circumstances, Turnell had no prior meditation experience, and was unable to gain any traction with it. “This almost became a something as an immense personal failing on my part,” he admits. “I would get advice on it, and I would try, but it was just completely hopeless! I think I was way too impatient.” Instead, his lifeline to preserving his sanity came in the form of books, which helped his mind escape the prison. Some books were mere escapism, others kept his mental agility and critical capacities sharpened, while some provided important inspiration or information. “To have any sort of stimulation completely removed was absolutely horrifying,” he says, describing the early stages of his imprisonment. Much of his book describes small moments of success when his wife or the Australian Embassy was able to get a shipment of books to him, as well as those darker moments, when he was transferred or his collection was confiscated.
Another way that he created intellectual stimulation was drawing on his academic background to study the functioning of the prison economy. For example, based on the fluctuating values of the different “Three-in-one” coffee and tea packets that operated as a kind of prison currency, he was able to make educated guesses about shortages and inflation in the country.
But the conditions of his incarceration remained, in his own words, “horrendous.” From his losing battle with the insects to suffering under Myanmar’s unrelenting tropical climate of intense heat and torrential rain to the disgusting and scarce food which was dished out of old paint buckets, everything about the experience was horrifying. As Turnell was also imprisoned during the pandemic, he caught COVID on five separate occasions, and describes a near total absence of any medical care.
However, even as Turnell was plunged deeper into these pits of Mordor, there was a silver lining to his Insein experience, as the many Burmese political prisoners welcomed him with open arms. To be embraced and cared for at the worst, and scariest, time of his life will forever stand out. “They showed compassion and courage… I'm just lost in gratitude,” he remarks, adding that he also understands the support was symbolic in some way as well, and transcended him personally. “I could tell just by my presence, and not me personally, but to the extent that I represented international interest, it was something that gave other people hope.” He couldn’t have asked for better company. Besides young Burmese activists, nearly the entire democratic leadership was imprisoned alongside him, leading Turnell to quip that they were attending BWU (Barbed Wire University) together. “The prisons in Myanmar, just being intellectually vibrant, it's part of the way that people survive,” he says, “Essentially the entire reform wing of the NLD government was all lumped in together, and yet, we used to have this seminar in the afternoon… nothing was off limits, we used to talk about everything from religion to politics, economics… it highlighted to me just the caliber of people that have been put away!”
Amazingly though, in spite of it all, Turnell was able to have a few guarded moments with Aung San Suu Kyi amid his various trial dates. As she has had virtually no access to media or foreign governments since the coup, Turnell’s encounters are significant to note. “She was especially proud of the young people and the way that they had stood up and justified all the hopes that her and others had for them… just immensely impressed!” He also describes the “extraordinary resilience and courage” she demonstrated. She was “immensely strong, and her biggest concern always to keep our spirits up.” Despite enduring worse treatment than many other prisoners, he saw an iron will in her to resist the regime even in these darkest moments. He recalls her once saying to him, “Look, Sean, don't feel that you've done anything wrong! This is all nonsense.” Their talk also delved into other areas beyond their imprisonment, as they updated one another on what news stories they’d managed to hear from the greater world, such as Queen Elizabeth’s death, and the falls from grace of Boris Johnson and Trump, and here he once again saw her biting wit and dry humor. They even had time to discuss familiar topic of shared interest, which included not only Lord of the Rings but also the Star Wars movies and French detective novels.
Eventually Turnell was released in a prisoner amnesty, along with 5,000 other inmates, and he left the country. However, his battle with the regime did not end there. As soon as he gained his freedom, Turnell began to speak out often, and forcefully, against the crimes of the junta. General Min Aung Hlaing was so incensed that he formally revoked his amnesty, called for his extradition, and demanded he appear back at court to be tried again. As absurd as that demand was, Turnell must be quite careful with his travel these days, and make sure he not visit or transit through countries that have relations with the military junta, like China or Russia.
The 650 days Turnell spent behind bars has changed him. “I've become a little bit more impatient with academia,” he admits, noting he now inclines towards greater activism and advocacy. He was also impacted in deeply personal ways. “I suffered in the prison, but I got to experience humanity at its very best, as well as some awful things. But again, I keep talking about this courage and compassion of Burmese people around me, and that just came through again and again! The way that people who had less than nothing, the way that they were so generous to this person who in every way imaginable was in a better position than them, this reaffirmed my faith in people.”
This is the sentiment that Turnell wants to close on. “From what I've seen, Myanmar is the collection of the best, the brightest, most courageous people I've ever met in my life and I remain confident that they'll win through in the end.”