Dear Soh Lung,
The arrests of 1987 marked a distinct heightening in international awareness and concern about the state of human rights in Singapore. I well remember the many inquiries I, as an Amnesty International member in Canada, received, and the immediate increase in campaigning on Singapore. It was a bleak time indeed for human rights. But in the following years, after their release, there was widespread sympathy for the former prisoners of conscience, who mostly remained silent, apart from those who were able to go into exile. Now in recent years, we have welcomed the forceful accounts of a number of those former prisoners who still live in Singapore. Those accounts are vital to the true record of Singapore’s history. Soh Lung, you were at the very centre of that group of young professionals who were arrested following their involvement in social justice issues. Your book will be essential to the telling of that shameful era – an era that is not yet fully past.
Margaret John
Coordinator for Singapore and Malaysia
Amnesty International Canada
