The country nestled between China, India and Thailand squeezed onto front pages last week but not always under the same name. While the BBC and the United States describe “Burma,” the New York Times and United Nations discuss “Myanmar.” The latter is how the ruling junta has asked English-speakers to translate the name since 1989.
It’s a country of 47 million that by any name smells of oppression and poverty. Though many Americans might not have heard of Burma before President Bush’s speech at the United Nations last week, the country has endured 45 years of military rule.
We sat down with two people hoping for change in Burma. Maureen Aung-Thwin is the director of the Burma Project at the Open Society Institute. Aung Din spent four years in a Burmese prison for helping lead the last large-scale protests in the country, in 1988.
