Burner phones, safehouses, sheltering with rebels and months away from loved ones -- Myanmar anti-coup activists have been driven underground by a brutal crackdown but have no regrets about choosing life on the run.

Myanmar has been in turmoil since the armed forces ousted civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi in February, plunging the country back under military rule after a 10-year experiment with democracy.

The power grab triggered a massive uprising which the junta has sought to quell with mass arrests and bloody crackdowns.

Some -- like longtime activist Thinzar Shunlei Yi -- had always known they might have to leave their home and family in order to keep up their battle against the regime.

"It's something I expected in my life as an activist," she told AFP by phone from a hidden location.

The 29-year-old is among the hundreds of social media-savvy fugitives -- social influencers, celebrities, activists and journalists -- wanted by the junta for disseminating information that "causes fear".

"When (the coup) happened, we found that many people were on the run," she said.

"We didn't expect that we would have an uprising like this and ordinary people would become protesters and activists."

But for Ko Ko -- not his real name -- the life of a fugitive was something much harder to imagine.

Just months ago he was working full-time at a government hospital on Myanmar's Covid response.

"Everything has changed," said the 30-year-old doctor, who now organises covert tele-medicine consultations for anti-coup protesters too afraid to go to military hospitals.

Moving frequently to avoid arrest, Ko Ko said he "stopped counting the days" after Myanmar's Thingyan New Year festival in April -- a period usually spent celebrating with family.

- Always on guard -

Myanmar's medical workers were among the first to join a nationwide anti-junta movement, which grew to bring hundreds of thousands to the streets.

By March, Ko Ko was training civilians to give first aid as the junta crackdown on dissent grew bloodier.

But increasing raids on makeshift trauma centres and mass arrests of healthcare workers were a wake-up call.

"If they found me, what would they do to my family?" he recalled thinking.

Two days after Armed Forces Day in March -- the single deadliest day since the coup, with more than 100 people killed across the country -- Ko Ko decided to leave his wife and parents.

After two weeks slipping furtively from house to house, he fled to territory controlled by a rebel group near the border with Thailand.

Always on alert, he carries a burner phone with a fake Facebook account in case authorities stop him.

"Every minute that I hear a car stop out front or if there's a loud voice, I always go out and check," he told AFP.

He is currently working to source supplies for a makeshift hospital he and other doctors are setting up -- a vast departure from his life just four months earlier.

- 'This is our duty' -

More than 850 people have been killed since the coup while thousands languish behind bars, according to a local monitoring group.

"It's a nightmare," said musician Ko Thein -- a pseudonym -- who grew in prominence for his vitriolic Facebook posts about the military after it ousted Suu Kyi's government.

He had stubbornly refused to go into hiding despite weeks of warnings from friends.

But when his name was broadcast on the nightly state-run TV news in early April, he immediately packed a bag, said farewell to his sister, and stole away from the back door of his apartment building.

"I didn't have a chance to say goodbye to my dog. He died on May 4," he said, speaking to AFP from an undisclosed location.

Still, he continues to share information on Facebook, and his profile as a allows him to connect local civilian groups with a shadow government working to oust the junta.

"I never feel regret about posting things. This is our duty as citizens of Myanmar," Ko Thein said, though he admits he misses his family.

Even for a seasoned activist like Thinzar Shunlei Yi, life on the run can be isolating, and monitoring the news can be "mentally draining".

"But it also gives us strength because many people have suffered and sacrificed their lives," she said.

"We need to keep moving, no matter what."

Wounded Myanmar protesters fear arrest in junta hospitals
Yangon (AFP) June 16, 2021 - Protesters shot during rallies against Myanmar's military regime are avoiding treatment for their wounds, fearing arrest if they visit junta-run hospitals and searching desperately for sympathetic doctors to operate on them in secret.

Security forces have fired on civilian protests with sniper rifles, machine guns and mortar rounds in the months since the February coup that ousted civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

More than 800 people have been killed and thousands of others wounded in a running crackdown on opposition to the military regime, according to rights groups.

Maung Win Myo -- his name and others have been changed for safety reasons -- used to scratch a meagre living as a trishaw driver, ferrying people around the bustling commercial capital of Yangon.

But the 24-year-old hasn't worked since March, when he was shot in the leg while on the frontlines of an anti-junta protest.

"I can't even sleep properly at night," he told AFP, wincing on a mattress on the floor of the one-room apartment he shares with his wife and two children.

It would cost about $950 to pay for a second operation at a private hospital to set the steel in his broken bone, he said, but he will have to keep on suffering for now.

"I don't have any money as I cannot work," he said, adding that he was relying on donations from neighbours to feed his family.

One costly visit to a private clinic has already left Maung Win Myo out of pocket.

"We didn't dare to go to military hospital, that's why we went to a private hospital, even though we don't have money," his wife said.

Many others with serious injuries are scared to seek free treatment at military hospitals, for fear their wounds will betray their involvement in anti-coup protests.

"Not everyone is willing to go," Marjan Besuijen, Head of Mission for Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) in Myanmar, told AFP.

"They fear arrest."

In a report last month, MSF also said its partners in Myanmar had witnessed junta raids on organisations "providing first aid to injured protesters, and seen their supplies destroyed."

- 'I don't know how to survive' -

Military hospitals are not normally open to the public but the junta has expanded their operations after many doctors walked off the job after the coup.

The strike, also joined by huge numbers of civil servants and other government employees, has forced the closure of almost all public hospitals in the country.

It has also crippled the economy and put a huge strain on the banking system.

Those lucky to still have jobs and savings face day-long queues at ATMs to withdraw a maximum of $120 per week, leaving many struggling to pay for food and rent -- let alone surgery.

Ngwe Nu Nu's husband was shot in the eye by security forces on his way to work at a rice broker's in the central city of Myingyan in late April.

The main breadwinner in the family, he was taken to Mandalay for treatment, but died in hospital a few days later, leaving Ngwe Nu Nu alone and indebted for his treatment.

"I tried my best to save his life," she told AFP. "Now I don't know how to survive without him."

As the coup enters its fifth month -- and with customs officials among those striking -- sourcing medicine is also getting harder.

For the last month "we have had difficulties in getting some medical materials for operations," as stockists run out, one doctor treating wounded protesters in Mandalay told AFP.

"If this lasts longer, it will impact more seriously on the patients," the doctor said, on condition of anonymity.

- 'Until the battle ends' -

Mother of three May Win, 50, is also unable to work after she was shot in the hand two months ago while protesting against the junta in Mandalay.

Sympathetic doctors put steel into her broken thumb for free, but over a month later, the injury has not fully healed.

"I used to go to work by driving a motorbike, but now I won't be able to work anymore," she told AFP.

But she also vows to go back out to protest when her hand is fully healed.

"I will go out again to fight because we must fight for our next generation and for our country until this battle ends," she told AFP.

Related Links
Democracy in the 21st century at TerraDaily.com

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