page_title: U Saw
section_title: Crime and punishment
hierarchical_section_title: U Saw / Crime and punishment
caption_attribution_description: English: U Saw was a leading Burmese politician and the Prime Minister of British Burma during the colonial era before the Second World War. He is also known for his role in the assassination of Burma's national hero Aung San and other independence leaders in July 1947, only months before Burma gained independence from Britain in January 1948. He was executed by hanging for this assassination.
context_page_description: U Saw, also known as Galon U Saw, was a leading Burmese politician who served as Prime Minister of British Burma during the colonial era before the Second World War. He is also known for his role in the assassination of Burma's national hero Aung San and other independence leaders in July 1947, only months before Burma gained independence from Britain in January 1948. He was executed by hanging for this assassination.
context_section_description: On 19 July 1947, a gang of armed paramilitaries broke into the Secretariat Building in downtown Rangoon during a meeting of the Executive Council (the shadow government established by the British in preparation for the transfer of power) and assassinated Aung San and six of his cabinet ministers; a cabinet secretary and a bodyguard were also killed. The evidence clearly implicated U Saw as the ringleader. U Saw and eight others behind the situation were arrested by the British authorities, and tried before a special tribunal set up by Sir Hubert Rance, the British colonial governor. U Saw was found guilty and sentenced to death on December 30, 1947. After Burma became independent in January 1948, the Burmese authorities decided to carry out the verdict of the British court, and in March 1948, the Rangoon High Court rejected his claims that the tribunal lacked jurisdiction and requests for a new trial, and upheld the death sentence. He was executed by hanging at Insein Jail on 8 May 1948. U Saw was buried, according to custom, in an unmarked grave within the prison.
  Many mysteries still surround the assassination. There were rumours of a conspiracy involving the British — a variation on this theory was given new life in a documentary broadcast by the BBC on the 50th anniversary of the assassination in 1997. What did emerge in the course of the investigations at the time of the trial, however, was that several low-ranking British officers had sold guns to a number of Burmese politicians, including U Saw. Shortly after U Saw's conviction, Captain David Vivian, a British Army officer, was sentenced to five years imprisonment for supplying U Saw with weapons. Captain Vivian escaped from prison during the Karen uprising in Insein in early 1949. Little information about his motives was revealed during his trial or after the trial.
caption: U Saw stands on the gallows at Insein prison in Rangoon, on May 8, 1948, as the hangman’s assistants manacle his hands behind him
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