Freedom tastes bitter-sweet for liberated Myanmar activist

March 5, 2012   YANGON (AFP) - For veteran dissident Ko Ko Gyi, freedom after almost two decades behind bars has brought guarded optimism about Myanmar's future, and no thoughts of revenge against the regime.

The former student activist, one of hundreds of political prisoners released in January in the country formerly known as Burma, said that he was ready for reconciliation if the quasi-civilian government continues its reforms.

'We had a bitter experience for a very long time, but we can forgive, not only myself, but also my comrades,' he told AFP in an interview.

'We do not want to dwell on the past, but instead face the brighter future... It is not going to be easy to forget, and we say that if we have to engage in politics the time is now, not in the past.' Mr Ko Ko Gyi said he and other prominent former student leaders who were at the vanguard of a failed 1988 uprising would give their full support to opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who is standing for a seat in parliament for the first time in April 1 by-elections, as well as to a new generation of activists.

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