Letter from Insein Prison: Demands for Prisoner’s Rights

By Assistance Association for Political Prisoners - Burma • February 17, 2010

We, as prisoners, demand the following rights to the authorities:

To read books including news papers
To get proper medical treatment
To get better foods for all prisoners
To be free to go out of our cell in our compound, except during closing time of the prison
To write and have access to paper and pens

The reasons we are making these demands are:

Reason 1. It takes one week to ten days to get magazines, journals, and books, which come from family members. Sometimes the pages are torn and the books have been censored. There is no regular access to news papers, the newspapers , when they do arrive, are often out of date and may come two or three days later.

Reason 2. We do not get enough medicine. It is difficult and the wait is long before seeing a doctor. There are no eye, ear, and mouth doctors. It is a difficult and long process to get medical treatment outside of the prison. There is poor sanitation; in particular, there are no covers for the toilet bucket s in solitary confinement.

Reason 3. The rice is of poor quality and includes grains of paddy and stones. The bean soup and the sour vegetable soup often have insects in it and is dirty. We only get two meat meals a week. The curry smells bad. We are not getting any salt.

Reason 4. Political prisoners are only allowed to walk outside for one hour in the morning and one hour in evening, and we have to spend the rest of the time ( 22 hours) in our cell.

Reason 5. We are not allowed to have our own paper or pens . If the authorities find out that a prisoner has paper or pens, the prisoner will be punished and sent to the punishment cell called the “Dog Cell”. We are not allowed to write to our families.

On behalf of Prisoners
Insein Prison, Rangon.

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