Would Senior General Than Shwe be called upon the dock like Saddam? Gen Shwe still rule as a dictator and Saddam does not.  One of them with years of experience as a dictator and the other is relatively fresh or inexperience in ruling a country but still rules seemly not wilted by the pressure to relinquish power.  A melodramatic defiance of Saddam in the Iraqi court indeed appeared to be an emotional Tsunami of the dictator. 

I woke up on Sunday morning with breaking news of Saddam Hussein’s trial in which the court passed a death sentence upon Saddam by hanging.  With my half awake mood I could not resist to flick through several TV channels to get live reporting from Iraq.  I managed to hold my flickering action of TV channels to listen to John Simpson, the BBC Chief Foreign Correspondent presenting live from outside the Iraqi court. 

Like several other commentators on Iraq, John never missed to highlight the verdict as “opening the gates of hell”.  “The gates of hell” - statement produced by Saddam’s Hussein’s lawyer weeks before the verdict became commentary words of almost every foreign journalist presenting the breaking news from Iraq.  The foreign journalists have every reason to take the words of Saddam’s lawyers seriously for a country with diverse religious and ethnic backgrounds.  The gates of hells have opened in the country since it’s invasion and further opening would not make a remarkable difference.

Would the gates of hell be opened in Burma if Senior Than Shwe is tried and humiliated with death sentence?  Finding the right way to put dictators and war criminals on trial is never easy.  Saddam regime consolidated the diverse country of Iraq with various incentives.  It’s foreign minister Tariq Azziz was Coptic Christian, several Shiite Muslim held senior position in his cabinet and also he gave an autonomous reign to Kurds. Dictators like in democracy - rule with supporters but not voters who keep them in power.  In return the dictators ensure the safety and security of those who respect them. 

The gates of hell in Iraq could have been prevented or minimized.  In the case of Mr Hussein it would have been a mistake to follow the Nuremberg model: putting the occupiers in charge would simply have made more Iraqis feel that they had been conquered by foreigners, not liberated from a tyranny.

The International Criminal Court established in The Hague in July 2002 was not an option, since it cannot try crimes committed before its inception. There was, besides, a good argument for holding the trial inside Iraq itself, where the crimes took place and where victims and their relatives could more easily follow its progress in a language they understood.

The Americans decided otherwise. The Iraqi Special Tribunal had only Iraqi judges, though they had access to international advisers and the court’s rules were modelled on those used in UN tribunals. Its performance has been mixed. Defence lawyers have been killed, and one judge resigned complaining of political pressure.

In short, it has been neither a perfect trial nor a show trial of the sort in which charges are trumped up, evidence fabricated, the verdict pre-ordained or the defendant denied a chance to answer his accusers.

It is worth taking the scenario of gates of hell to Burma in a hypothetical situation of deposed Gen Than Shwe. The case of genocide for Saddam was mass killing of Shiite Muslims. To an urbanite Burmese like myself I have not witnessed any genocide by military regime of Burma but mass killing of demonstrators in the capital during 1988 democracy uprising. 

No doubt, Mr Guy Horton, an International Human Rights researcher has documented an internationally acclaimed report on genocide by the military junta of Burma upon it’s indigenous population.  I will leave Mr Horton to dwell with the subject of genocide but I am more concerned with the people who would support the deposed Burmese military junta and are willing to die for them through thick and thin.

I do not dare to ponder the matter by myself and I resorted to meet a couple of young Burmese residing in London for a discussion in a cafeteria in an Arab neighborhood in London.  Interestingly they gave an example of corrupt oligarch Mafiosi of Burma who did not react to the imprisonment and out posting of General Khin Nyunt who looked after their business interests. 

The population inside Burma has the rights to decide on how to try the deposed Gen Than Shew and chorines.  The military and its institution is undoubtedly fully assimilated in society and it is bound to hurt someone if they are going to be given a death sentences.  The options I would look for would be the model of truth and reconciliation commission or a hybrid tribunal, like the one set up in Sierra Leone that would include foreign judges and operate under international law.

No matter how the Burmese population would decide to bring the military junta to justice I certainly would not like to see gates of hell opened in Burma but I look forward to seeing the gates of reconciliation and new Burma opened.