Fantasy world

The year 2009 marks the centenary of the birth of U Thant, who served as Secretary-General of the United Nations from 1961 to 1971. He was selected to head the world body when Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjöld was killed in an air crash in September 1961. U Thant was born at Pantanaw, Myanmar (formerly called Burma), on 22 January 1909, and was educated at the National High School in Pantanaw and at University College, Yangon (formerly called Rangoon). Prior to his diplomatic career, U Thant’s
experience was in education and information work.

At the time of his appointment as Acting Secretary-General of the United Nations, U Thant had been Permanent Representative of Burma to the United Nations, with the rank of Ambassador (1957-1961). During that period, he headed the Burmese delegations to the sessions of the General Assembly, and in 1959, he served as one of
the Vice-Presidents of the Assembly’s fourteenth session. In 1961, U Thant was Chairman of the United Nations Congo Conciliation Commission and Chairman of the Committee on a United Nations Capital Development Fund. During his diplomatic career, U Thant served on several occasions as adviser to Prime Ministers of Burma.

U Thant began serving as Acting Secretary- General on 3 November 1961, when he was unanimously appointed by the General Assembly, on the recommendation of the Security Council, to fill the unexpired term of the late Secretary- General, Dag Hammarskjöld. He was then unanimously appointed Secretary-General by the
General Assembly on 30 November 1962 for a term of office ending on 3 November 1966.
U Thant was appointed for a second term as Secretary-General of the United Nations by the General Assembly on 2 December 1966 on the unanimous recommendation of the Security Council (resolution 229 (1966) of 2 December 1966). His term of office continued until 31 December 1971.

U Thant died of lung cancer in New York on November 25, 1974. By this time Burma was ruled by a military junta which refused him any honors. The then Burmese President Ne Win was envious of U Thant's international stature and the respect that was accorded him by the Burmese populace. Ne Win also resented U Thant's close links with the democratic government of U Nu which Ne Win had overthrown in a coup d'etat on March 2, 1962. Ne Win ordered that U Thant be buried without any official involvement or ceremony.

From the United Nations headquarters in New York, U Thant's body was flown back to Rangoon but no guard of honour or high ranking officials were on hand at the airport when the coffin arrived.

On the day of U Thant's funeral on December 5, 1974, tens of thousands of people lined the streets of Rangoon to pay their last respects to their distinguished countryman whose coffin was displayed at Rangoon's Kyaikasan race course for a few hours before the scheduled burial.

The coffin of U Thant was then snatched by a group of students just before it was scheduled to leave for burial in an ordinary Rangoon cemetery. The student demonstrators buried U Thant on the former grounds of the Rangoon University Students Union (RUSU), which Ne Win had dynamited and destroyed on July 8, 1962.

During the period of December 5–11, 1974, the student demonstrators also built a temporary mausoleum for U Thant on the grounds of the RUSU and gave anti-government speeches. In the early morning hours of December 11, 1974, government troops stormed the campus, killed some of the students guarding the make-shift mausoleum, removed U Thant's coffin, and reburied it at the foot of the Shwedagon Pagoda, where it has continued to lie.

Upon hearing of the storming of the Rangoon University campus and the forcible removal of U Thant's coffin, many people rioted in the streets of Rangoon. Martial law was declared in Rangoon and the surrounding metropolitan areas. What has come to be known as the U Thant crisis — the student-led protests over the shabby treatment by the Ne Win government of U Thant — was crushed by the Burmese government.

U Thant's Famous Quotes

Every human being, of whatever origin, of whatever station, deserves respect. We must each respect others even as we respect ourselves.

Wars begin in the minds of man, and in those minds, love and compassion would have built the defenses of peace.


FIRST DAY CANCELLATIONS 100TH ANNIVERSARY U THANT

On 6 February 2009, special first day handcancellations for the “100th Anniversary U Thant” stamps will be available at United Nations Headquarters in New York, the Palais des Nations, Geneva, and the Vienna International Centre. The New York hand-cancellation is illustrated below: