DEMOCRATIC VOICE OF BURMA JOURNALISTS CONTINUE WORK

(15 Jun 2012) The spirit of Myanmar's struggle for democracy is evident in an anonymous Oslo office.
A stylised picture of democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi is on the back of a desktop computer and an imposing poster on the wall commemorating "90,000 flames for freedom" - the signatures of 90-thousand people on an Amnesty International petition in solidarity with Suu Kyi.
From the outside, the building doesn't look like the headquarters of an international media channel which has defied Myanmar authorities for years.
But inside it is home to more than a dozen journalists working for the Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB).
The DVB started illicit radio broadcasts from Norway to Myanmar two decades ago. In the mid-1990s they added television programmes.
"Some like to call us the opposition media, but actually we're not," says Than Win Htut, DVB's sub-editor of news.
"We report every story people should know, but sometimes, very often, these are the stories the government wants to hide," he adds.
Htut, who worked as a magazine journalist in Myanmar before moving abroad to work for DVB, sits in the station's compact master control room, where the broadcasts are compiled.
Introductions and "links" are recorded by a presenter in a small, modern studio adjacent to the newsroom; while reports are filed from Myanmar via a network of local journalists.
"Our audience are mainly from inside Burma," says Htut. "They're watching through the satellite receiver dish but also many other Burmese are living abroad they are watching television... through the internet."
This week, DVB journalists are gearing up for the forthcoming visit of Suu Kyi.
The Nobel laureate will travel to Oslo on Friday, to meet the exile community and human rights organisations, as well as to give the speech she was unable to deliver in 1991.
At the time she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, which the Nobel Committee said was "for her non-violent struggle for democracy and human rights", Suu Kyi was detained under house arrest in her homeland.
Htut describes Suu Kyi's visit to Norway as "very much different, very significant" to other Myanmar news events he's covered.
He sees this as a chance for Myanmar exiles, some of whom have been in Norway for 20 years, to meet the opposition leader who campaigned tirelessly for democratic reform.
"Daw San Suu Kyi herself also could be happy to talk to people she couldn't meet in the past," he says. "Maybe she could be happy to listen to all sorts of walks of life, all different groups of Norwegian society here."


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