A Buddhist Nun, Burned Alive

The following essay submission is by someone in upper Myanmar who wishes to remain confidential, for safety reasons.

Recently, many local media outlets reported on the suffering of internally displaced villagers from Khin-U, a township in Sagaing Region that many meditators may know of, as it is near the home of Ingyinbin where the meditation master Webu Sayadaw came from. Over 10,000 villagers from 16 villages fled their homes due to continuous attacks from the Myanmar military! And yet scarcely any news story to be found of such a mass exodos taking place beyond our borders.

It was however reported locally, and amongst these sad news reports, one of the most shocking pieces was that a 76-year-old Buddhist nun named Daw Seik was burned alive by some soldiers! According to a video that accompanied the story, villagers who had their homes burned confirmed the death of the aged nun from their village. The crying woman see in the accompanying video is the daughter of the nun. She said that her family had seven members including her mother. Because the family had so many children, the daughter said her mother, who was unable to walk, was left at home because they were unable to carry her. The villagers said she had asked them to leave her behind because she believed the soldiers would not harm a elderly nun who was unable to walk. How wrong they all were! The villagers found a small pile of ashes in the outline of her body in a fetal position. But her body was found not in her house where she had been left, but in a different place where they assumed she had been taken and burned. The villagers claimed she had not been killed due to the falling beams or the roof, but she was deliberately burned. Tragically, the aged nun’s belief in the honesty and humanity of the soldiers was proven wrong.

According to a report by the International Commission of Jurists (icj), 92 religious or sacred sites comprising 32 Buddhist buildings or shrines (including monasteries, stupas, and Dhamma halls), 55 Christian buildings (including a convent), and 5 Islamic sites have been destroyed or damaged by the Myanmar military in the sixteen months from February 2021 to May 2022. The report also stated that 27 Buddhist sites (including 24 monasteries, 2 monastic schools, and 1 Jivitadana Sangha hospital that cares for Buddhist monks and nuns), 10 Christian sites, and 5 Islamic religious buildings have been raided by junta troops. And 42 places of worship in 12 states and regions have been used as military camps by the junta. The report also stated that as of 31 May, 2022, 86 religious leaders had been detained by the military, which includes 49 Buddhist clergy, among them a 70-year-old nun. Many people in Myanmar and around the world have lamented the frequent burning of houses, pagodas, monasteries, and other religious buildings, including UNESCO World Heritage sites. The junta has egregiously violated the right to freedom of religion or belief, which goes against international law, the 2008 national Constitution, and Myanmar law.

While few have doubted the extent to which the Tatmadaw has sought to harm those in its borders who are not Bamar and not Buddhist, this report also confirms that no one in our country is safe from their brand of terrorism and oppression, and that our current military leaders are perhaps the greatest threat to the survival of the Dhamma that our land has seen in centuries!