Win Aung, a former foreign minister and one of ex-spy chief Gen Khin Nyunt’s aides, died on Wednesday morning at 1:55 a.m. local time in Rangoon’s infamous Insein Prison. He was 65.
According to prison sources in Rangoon, Win Aung died of a cerebral hemorrhage. Burmese authorities allowed Win Aung’s family to post his obituary in Thursday’s state-run newspapers.
He is survived by his wife, one daughter and two sons. His younger son, Thaung Suu Nyein, is the editor-in-chief of a leading Rangoon-based weekly, 7 Days News Journal.
Win Aung was arrested in September 2004, a month before a government crackdown on powerful Military Intelligence officers. The junta announced Win Aung and his deputy Khin Maung Win’s retirement following news that Win Aung had told senior officials at an Association of Southeast Asian Nations Ministry meeting in Jakarta in July 2004 that Burmese Prime Minister Khin Nyunt was in political trouble.
“He [Khin Nyunt] is in a dangerous position,” Win Aung was quoted as saying. “Khin Nyunt may have to flee the country. If that happens, I will have to flee with him.”
Win Aung was replaced by Maj-Gen Nyan Win, the deputy head of the military training college who was junta chief Snr-Gen Than Shwe’s choice.
After his arrest, Wing Aung was detained under house arrest for two years. In 2006, he was sentenced to a 7-year jail term on charges of misuse of authority. He was detained in Insein Prison until he died.
Win Aung served as Burma’s foreign minister under the military regime from 1998 to 2004. He had previously been Burmese ambassador to Germany and the United Kingdom before being recalled to Burma to take up the foreign minister position.
Win Aung led a Burmese delegation to the UN General Assembly in September 2003 a few months after a brutal crackdown on pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s convoy in Depayin had led to international criticism of the regime and economic sanctions on Burma.
At the UN, he said it was “disconcerting that some countries have chosen to turn a blind eye to the reality.”
In his earlier days, Win Aung was an officer with Military Intelligence. As a major, he was close to then spy chief Brig-Gen Tin Oo, the No 2 in the country after dictator Ne Win.
Following Tin Oo’s removal, Win Aung was reappointed as a counsel-general with several Burmese consulates in Asia in the early 1980s.
Fluent in English, Win Aung was said to be media savvy with foreign journalists. Unlike current Foreign Minister Nyan Win, he was willing to give regular interviews with foreign media, including Time Magazine.
“I am a democratic person myself,” Win Aung told Time in 1999. “I would like my children and myself to live under a real democratic situation.”
He added that this sentiment was also held by junta chief Snr-Gen Than Shwe and other members of the junta.
Before his removal from the foreign minister post, he wrote religious and political articles under the pen name of Sithu Nyein Aye.
Burma observers generally concurred that Win Aung was one of the first senior junta officials to become a victim of the dog-eat-dog world that exists in Burma’s military hierarchy.
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