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The unfolding tragedy of Burma

26th September 2007 by Helena 2 Comments  

Aung San Suu KyiI have always admired Aung San Suu Kyi. She is not only one of the world’s most elegant and beautiful women, but also one of the most selfless and determined. Here is a woman who could have lived as a free woman with her husband and sons. Instead she chose to continue the struggle for Burmese democracy her father began. She won a general election by a landslide in 1990 but was placed under house arrest and the military took power.

She has had to watch her sons grow up from afar and make the most difficult choice of not returning to England to see her husband one last time before he died of prostate cancer. The military regime told her she would not be allowed to return to Burma if she left. She has no control over her life, cannot see whom she wishes, they even stopped her playing her piano at one stage. But throughout she has been calm, dignified and pragmatic. And every day she wears fresh flowers in her hair.

The uprising in Burma needs global support. And much as I applaud Gordon Brown for speaking out early sanctions are not going to help. What is needed is for the whole world to put pressure on China and India, two states the Burmese junta seem to listen to. They don’t give a monkeys what we think of them and the military leaders will not be short of food, it is the people who will suffer, as always. We should threaten to boycott the Olympics in China unless the Chinese act now.

The sight of Buddhist monks walking gracefully in unified protest through the streets of Rangoon is moving and powerful. But I fear instead of poise and dignity we will soon be seeing blood and violence. Although monks have a revered status in Burma this brutal regime will stop at nothing to hold on to power; power which it snatched from Aung San Suu Kyi and which the world community must now help her to regain for the good of her country and her people.

Copyright: Helena Frith Powell 2007


Filed Under: Women, blog --> Tagged With: burma, tragedy, unfolding

2 thoughts on The unfolding tragedy of Burma

  • Jonathan Miller says:
    27th September 2007 at 2:59 pm

    Right on girl!

  • margaret says:
    27th September 2007 at 10:11 pm

    How sad am I; mulling over your blog on a long drive from Reigate, home. Yes, I did have lunch with a gorgeous man but he was history whilst your solution to the Burma tragedy was on my mind.

    It is horrendous, shocking, totally unacceptable and something should be done now. I like the idea of putting enormous pressure on China but taking away from the athletes, who have trained, given their all through gruelling training for one, maybe even their last, chance of reaching the pinnacle of their sport is not fair to them. So, lets have the Olympics, just not in China. Give China an ultimatum with a tight deadline, ” act by midnight tomorrow, or the Games will be held in ??Greece or another country who has the infrastructure for a huge sporting event.

    So, I will now pour myself a glass of Chablis, contemplate lunch and hit the sack. Night!

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Helena Frith Powell was born in Sweden to a Swedish mother and Italian father, but grew up mainly in England. She is the author of eleven books, translated into several languages including Chinese and Russian. She wrote the French Mistress column The Sunday Times about life in France for several years. She is a regular contributor to the Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, The Times, Daily Telegraph, Tatler Magazine and Harper’s Bazaar.

Helena has been the editor of four magazines, including M Magazine, a supplement for the Abu Dhabi-based National Newspaper and FIVE, a high-end fashion glossy, also published in Abu Dhabi. Helena was also editor-in-chief of 360 Life, a quarterly glossy magazine published with the Sports 360 Newspaper in Dubai, part of the Chalhoub Group.

Helena contributes regularly to UK-based newspapers and magazines and holds a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. She is working on a thriller set in Sweden as well as a novel about the relationship between Virginia Woolf and Katherine Mansfield called Sense of an Echo.

In 2022 her short story The Japanese Gardener came second in the Fish Publishing Short Story Prize. One of her stories was also shortlisted for the Bridport Short Story Prize. When she’s not writing, she works as a headhunter for the media and entertainment industry for the Sucherman Group. 

Helena, who was educated at Durham University, lives in the Languedoc region of France with her husband Rupert and their three children.

Bibliography

More France Please, we’re British; Gibson Square 2004

Two Lipsticks and a Lover 2005; Gibson Square (hardback)

All You Need to be Impossibly French; (US version of above) Penguin 2006

Two Lipsticks and a Lover; Arrow Books (paperback) 2007

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (hardback) 2006

Ciao Bella Gibson Square; (paperback) 2007

So Chic! (French version of Two Lipsticks) Leduc Editions 2008 (also translated into Chinese, Russian and Thai)

More, More France; Gibson Square 2009

To Hell in High Heels; Arrow Books 2009 (also translated into Polish)

The Viva Mayr Diet; Harper Collins 2009

Love in a Warm Climate; Gibson Square 2011

The Ex-Factor; Gibson Square 2013

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles; Gibson Square 2016

The Arnolfini Marriage; Amazon Kindle December 2016

Smart Women Don’t Get Wrinkles (paperback); Gibson Square spring 2018

The Longest Night; Gibson Square spring 2019

 

 

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