PBA DESK : Lawyers for two Reuters journalists jailed
for seven years in Myanmar on charges linked to their reporting of the
Rohingya crisis are set Friday to lodge an appeal with the Supreme Court — a
last chance of a reprieve through the legal system.
Reporters Wa Lone, 32, and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28, both Myanmar nationals, were
arrested in Yangon in December 2017 and later jailed for violating the
Official Secrets Act. Reuters says the charge was trumped up to muzzle their
reporting into a massacre of Rohingya men.
The two were convicted of possessing classified information regarding
security operations in Rakhine state, from where hundreds of thousands of
Rohingya Muslims fled during an army-led crackdown the United Nations has
described as “ethnic cleansing”.
But their sentence provoked outcry over media freedom in Myanmar with
calls echoing across the world for their immediate release.
In January Yangon’s High Court rejected their initial appeal leaving their
fate in the hands of judges at the Supreme Court.
“We are going to appeal this morning,” lawyer Khin Maung Zaw told AFP from
the capital Naypyidaw, seat of the Supreme Court.
“We hope they are not going to reject it.”
Under Myanmar law Supreme Court judges hear appeals individually, giving
lawyers for the journalists several options.
The process is expected to take several months.
The only other chance of early release comes from a presidential pardon.
Rights groups have heaped pressure on de facto civilian leader Aung San
Suu Kyi to use her leverage to secure a pardon. But she has steadfastedly
refused to intervene in the case in favour of the reporters, describing it as
an issue for the courts.
At the time of their arrest the men were probing the extrajudicial killing
of 10 Rohingya men at Inn Din village in northern Rakhine state.
The pair insist they were victims of a police set-up.
Testimony during the trial from a whistleblowing officer appeared to
validate their claim.
Moe Yan Naing, was initially called as a prosecution witness, but stunned
the court by saying superiors had ordered police to entrap the reporters.
His breaking of the ranks was extremely rare from a serving member of
Myanmar’s secretive security apparatus and he was jailed for a year after
giving testimony.
On Friday the ex-policeman walked free after serving his sentence at
Yangon’s Insein prison — where the Reuters reporters are also doing their
time.
“I’ve never broken any police regulations in my life, but the police
regulations are not perfect,” he told reporters as he left the jail.
“Members of the police force are suffering under these,” he said, calling
for reform “as part of the transition to democracy”.
PBA/zizi
