[3] In September 1987, Ne Win had voided most denominations of the kyat without warning, causing many people to lose their savings overnight.
On 21 September 2004, Ohn Than staged his first solo protest, standing alone before the Yangon office of the United Nations Development Program with a poster calling for free elections and a UN investigation of the "Depayin Massacre".
[8] On 12 February 2007—Burma's Union Day—Ohn Than again appeared in international news by protesting alone outside of the National League for Democracy headquarters in Yangon.
[10] Ohn Than again helped lead the protests, staging another solo demonstration before the US Embassy in downtown Yangon on 23 August.
[11] He held up posters calling for UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to intervene to protect protesters from military reprisals, and for troops in the Tatmadaw (Burmese armed forces) to refuse the orders of their superiors.
[13] He was subsequently held in a military camp until January 2008,[12] when he was taken to Yangon's Insein Prison for trial on charges under article 124 (A) of the criminal code, “acts that destabilize the government".
[12] Ohn Than's sentence was protested by Human Rights Watch, which included him in its report Burma's Forgotten Prisoners.