Ex-minister who witnessed ‘horrible’ Myanmar military violence joins calls for Aung San Suu Kyi’s release
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Paul Scully, whose family left Myanmar for Britain, saw ‘horrible things’ as Rohingya Muslim minority suffered violence and persecution. A former minister whose family left Myanmar for Britain has added his voice to growing calls for freedom for Aung San Suu Kyi, currently imprisoned by the brutal dictatorship there.
Paul Scully said her role as the figurehead for the campaign for democracy in the country was “both why she remains in prison and why we should keep pushing for her release”. His comments come after three former UK foreign secretaries called for the 80-year-old to be freed, warning she was being held on trumped-up charges and deserved the chance to lead her country democratically.
Placed under house arrest for 15 years between 1989 and 2010 before she was finally released, her fight for democracy made her a global figure and she was awarded the Nobel peace prize. But she has become a deeply divisive and controversial figure after she refused to speak out against her country’s extreme violence against its Rohingya Muslim minority.
Her fall from grace is explored in a new Independent TV documentary, Cancelled: The rise and fall of Aung San Suu Kyi, which takes an unbiased look at her life and the plight of Myanmar. Watch: Cancelled: The rise and fall of Aung San Suu Kyi Documentary on Independent TV.
Mr Scully, who also served as Theresa May’s trade envoy to Myanmar, said Ms Suu Kyi’s time as the country’s de facto prime minister would “forever be marred by her dismissal of the Rohingya people and her complicity in their repression, but she also knew that the country was only one step away from a return to military rule.
