CHAPTER 4: The Oriental House Peace Summit and the Eve of Tragedy
Written by Maung Maung (Shwe Keraweik) and translated by Dr. Ko Ko Gyi.
CHAPTER 4: The Oriental House Peace Summit and the Eve of Tragedy
At that time, U Wirathu was actively spreading false, baseless propaganda accusing Myanmar’s Muslims of turning their mosques into hidden military bases stocked with ammunition stored in underground bunkers.
To completely dismantle this dangerous lie, we decided to invite Buddhist monks from all four corners of Mandalay, along with leaders from other religious faiths, to a formal luncheon (since Buddhist monks abstain from eating after noon). Our plan was to openly offer the monks the freedom to choose and inspect any mosque they wished in Mandalay to prove we had nothing to hide.
The Islamic organizations entrusted me with the responsibility of organizing this event, securing the legal permits from the relevant authorities, and extending a personal invitation to U Wirathu. The chosen date was March 19, 2013.
Extending the Invitation
I went directly to U Wirathu to invite him, requesting that he definitely attend the function and deliver a speech. However, when U Wirathu reviewed our guest list and noticed the names of highly revered, national-level senior abbots—such as the Central Executive Committee member of the National Monks’ Association (Ma Ha Na), the Division-level Sanga Patron Sayardawgyi, the Shwe Kyin Religious Head Sayardawgyi, and the Shwe War Win Kyaung Sayardaws—he balked.
U Wirathu remarked that he did not dare speak or preach in front of such great, highly learned Sayardawgyis, and flatly refused to be a speaker at our function.
Securing the official event permit proved to be an exhausting uphill battle. I followed the standard administrative bureaucracy, moving from the local ward administration office all the way up to the Divisional General Administrative Department, but my application was repeatedly rejected.
Seeking a way forward, I consulted the Mandalay Division Mineral and Religious Minister, U Than Soe Myint, who advised me to bypass the lower channels and apply directly to Prime Minister U Ye Myint.
I followed his advice and submitted a formal application. However, PM U Ye Myint demanded that I provide concrete evidence of the hate speech circulating at the time to justify the event. Consequently, I had to compile and attach the highly inflammatory papers, pamphlets, books, and video CDs distributed by U Wirathu directly to my application letter.
Author’s Note: This serves as definitive, official proof that the Muslim community had formally complained to the highest levels of government regarding U Wirathu’s dangerous hate speech, yet no action was taken to stop him.
While I was consumed with navigating this grueling permit process, U Wirathu was busy traveling through the urban wards and surrounding villages of Meiktila and Yamethin. He was working overtime to spread intense Islamophobia, preaching lies about Islam, distributing anti-Muslim literature, instructing Buddhists to boycott Muslim-owned businesses, and aggressively handing out “969” nationalist stickers.
Sabotage at the Oriental House
After repeatedly appealing to the Religious Minister, U Than Soe Myint, I finally managed to secure the event permit.
We brought together a distinguished assembly: elderly and deeply revered abbots from all four corners of Mandalay, various Buddhist associations, Christian, Hindu, and Baha’i religious leaders, Islamic scholars, civil rights organizations from Yangon, Union Minister U Aung Min from the Myanmar Peace Centre, representatives from MRA Malaysia, and various interested observers. The historic gathering took place in the Grand Ballroom of the Oriental House on March 19, 2013.
We made meticulous, respectful arrangements: a special, exclusive space upstairs was prepared to serve Swun (lunch) to the monastic delegation, while a biryani lunch was prepared for the other guests downstairs. The rental fee for the ballroom and the catering for the monks were generously donated by the owner of the Oriental House.
Tragically, the state-backed machinery worked behind the scenes to sabotage the event before it even began. During their early morning breakfast, high-ranking abbots—including the Mandalay Division Sanga Association CEC Chairman and the Chief Abbot of the Old Masoeyein Monastery—were fiercely cornered and pressured by radical young monks from the Old Masoeyein Monastery. These young extremists explicitly told the elders not to attend a function organized by “Kalars” (a derogatory term used for Muslims). As a result, the peace-advocate monks we sent to usher the senior abbots to the venue were forced to return empty-handed.
When the guests began taking their seats in the ballroom, I noticed that several people were holding political booklets. Upon inquiring, I discovered that these anti-Islam propaganda books had been systematically smuggled in and distributed by the young radical monks accompanying U Wirathu. I immediately instructed our youth volunteers to quietly confiscate the literature.
Confronting U Wirathu
Once it became clear that the senior, moderate abbots would not be attending due to intimidation, and just moments before the opening ceremony, U Wirathu suddenly changed his mind and demanded to be allowed to preach.
Ashin Issariya (popularly known as Uzin Jaung Jaung), a prominent Saffron Revolution monk from Yenanchaung, approached me alongside U Eindrasekka—the radical monk from the Old Masoeyein Monastery who had just pressured the elder abbots into boycotting our event. They requested that I alter the official agenda to insert U Wirathu onto the list of speakers.
I firmly refused. I pointed out that we could not alter the schedule at the last minute, especially since U Wirathu had explicitly rejected our initial request to speak, and we could not trust that his sudden change of mind was sincere.
A moment later, another peace-monk pulled me aside and warned, “U Maung Maung, it is better to just let U Wirathu speak, otherwise he will create a serious problem here.” I told him I needed to consult our organizing committee. When I did, not a single member of the committee agreed to let him speak, so I stood by our refusal.
Uzin Jaung Jaung summoned me again, visibly stressed: “U Maung, he is going to cause trouble. Just let him speak.” At that exact moment, one of the radical monks standing nearby openly threatened us: “If U Wirathu is not allowed to speak, he and his followers will walk out in protest right now to completely ruin your function.”
Realizing the volatility of the situation, I decided to handle it directly. I walked onto the elevated stage reserved exclusively for the clergy, bypassed the first two rows, and walked straight to the third row where U Wirathu was seated.
Addressing him in the respectful, formal language reserved strictly for the monastic community, I said firmly:
“U Zin, I personally went to your monastery and invited you to be a key speaker at this event, and you chose to refuse my request. I cannot alter our official agenda at the last minute. I hope U Zin understands that I have signed a legal bond with the government to hold this event. If anything untoward happens, or if this function is intentionally disrupted, I am the one who will be held legally responsible and will suffer the consequences. Do whatever you feel you must do.”
U Wirathu laughed, looked at me, and replied, “I won’t walk out. Go ahead and conduct your function calmly.”
True to his word, U Wirathu stayed until the very end of the summit. However, when lunch was served, he initially refused to touch the food. I had to personally go upstairs to the monastic dining area, serve the biryani onto his plate myself, and formally offer it to him before he would eat.
(Images of me sitting respectfully at his side serving him biryani were later widely circulated on Facebook by his followers to craft a narrative of submission).
Aggression in the Shadows
While the summit proceeded successfully inside the ballroom—with leaders from various faiths delivering beautiful speeches focused on peace, unity, and coexistence—an entirely different scene was playing out in the parking lot outside.
A radical “969” monk from the Sin Tae monastery in western Mandalay, widely known as the “Kung Fu Monk,” arrived at the venue leading three other monks and a mob of about 15 civilians. They began shouting vulgar, highly insulting abuse at the guests arriving at the hall.
When I walked outside to inspect the disturbance, the civilian mob backed away toward the corner of 30th Street, while the three radical monks boldly marched directly into the building. They stood at the back of the hall, glaring hostilely at our Muslim youth volunteers and taking aggressive photos of everyone in attendance.
I walked straight up to their leader, the “Kung Fu Monk,” took him firmly by the arm, and said, “If you are true monks, there is a respected, proper place for you upstairs.” I escorted him and his followers up to the monastic dining area and had them seated. These uninvited monks quietly ate the donated lunch, took the saffron robes we were gifting to the clergy, and left.
Author’s Note: This “Kung Fu Monk” and a civilian woman named Ma Myint Myint Kyi were the primary leaders of the radical “969” extremist cell in Mandalay. They routinely marched through local bazaars, markets, and housing estates distributing nationalist stickers and deliberately instigating targeted harassment against Muslim-owned shops.
Meanwhile, Union Ministers U Aung Min and U Soe Thein, alongside representatives from the government-backed Myanmar Peace Centre (MPC) and a foreign NGO, heavily exploited our peaceful gathering for political theater. They had promised to bring major state television networks like SkyNet TV, MRTV, and Myawaddy TV to broadcast our message of unity, and promised to distribute our peace pamphlets. Instead, they merely used the event as a backdrop to film and photograph themselves for state propaganda. Despite subtle hints that they would financial assist with the summit’s immense costs, they failed to contribute a single cent—though we later suspected they claimed heavy expenses from their parent organizations using the footage shot at our venue.
The Eve of the Onslaught
At the conclusion of the event, we arranged a fleet of cars specifically to transport the Buddhist monks to inspect any mosque of their choosing in Mandalay, completely disproving the rumors of underground armories.
However, the moment the event concluded, U Wirathu and his core followers hurriedly left the venue, dismissively stating that they had other urgent, important matters to attend to.
With the instigator gone, the remaining moderate monks felt uncomfortable proceeding. One elder monk remarked that since the very person who had leveled these serious military accusations against the mosques had fled, it was no longer appropriate or necessary for them to conduct an inspection. Another elderly monk kindly noted that he had never actually believed the mosques were military bases; he had simply wished to step inside a mosque out of curiosity since he had never seen one in his life, but since the group was dispersing, he requested to be driven back to his monastery.
That evening, Ko Shine, a liaison officer for the Malaysian Relief Agency (MRA) NGO, informed us that their organization wished to sponsor an all-expenses-paid excursion to Malaysia for U Wirathu and a delegation of ten monks. The goal was to show them firsthand how a multi-religious, multi-ethnic society could live together in genuine harmony.
I personally sent Ko Shine’s delegation to U Wirathu’s monastery to pitch the tour. It was only during that meeting we discovered a telling fact: although U Wirathu eagerly wanted to travel abroad, the military government had quietly confiscated his passport, keeping him on a tight, domestic leash.
Later that same night, U Eindrasekka—the disruptive monk from the Old Masoeyein Monastery—posted a flagrant lie on his Facebook page, claiming that he and U Wirathu had been aggressively denied their right to speak at the summit by the “Kalars.” This highly coordinated, successful multi-religious peace function took place on March 19, 2013.
The very next morning, on March 20, 2013… Meiktila was systematically and brutally terrorized in a one-sided slaughter.
To be continued…
