Myanmar to release 4 foreigners, including an American, in broad prisoner amnesty
BANGKOK — Myanmar’s military-controlled government announced Thursday that it was releasing and deporting an Australian academic, a Japanese filmmaker, an ex-British diplomat and a U.S. citizen as part of a broad prisoner amnesty to mark the country’s National Victory Day.
Australian Sean Turnell, Japan’s Toru Kubota, Briton Vicky Bowman, and American Kyaw Htay Oo, as well as 11 local Myanmar celebrities, were among a total of 5,774 prisoners who were being released, Myanmar’s state-run MRTV reported.
The imprisonment of the foreign nationals had been a source of friction between Myanmar’s leaders and their home governments, which had been lobbying for their release.
According to the Assistance Assn. for Political Prisoners, a rights organization, 16,232 people have been detained on political charges in Myanmar since the army ousted the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in February of last year.
Of those arrested, 13,015 were still in detention as of Wednesday, the AAPP said. At least 2,465 civilians have been killed by security forces in the same period, the group said, with the actual total thought to be far higher.
Tim O’Connor of Amnesty International Australia welcomed the decision to release Turnell, saying that, like many others, Turnell should never have been arrested or jailed.
An escalation of fighting in Rakhine state is overextending the junta’s forces and giving local ethnic insurgents an opportunity to consolidate power.
“Amnesty continues to call for the release of all those arbitrarily detained for peacefully exercising their human rights,” he said. “Thousands of people jailed since the coup in Myanmar have done nothing wrong.”
Japan’s top government spokesman, Hirokazu Matsuno, told reporters that Kubota was due to leave Myanmar on a flight Thursday night and could be in Japan as soon as Friday. He said officials believed the 26-year-old Tokyo-based documentary filmmaker to be in good health.
Britain’s embassy in Yangon said Bowman had not yet been released from prison. Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong tweeted that she welcomed reports of Turnell being released, but would not comment further for the time being.
Kyaw Htay Oo, a naturalized American, returned to Myanmar, the country of his birth, in 2017, according to media reports. He was arrested in September 2021 on terrorism charges and has been in custody ever since. The U.S. Embassy in Yangon referred inquiries to Washington.
The army takeover in Myanmar a year ago unexpectedly aborted the ongoing restoration of representative democracy in the Southeast Asian country.
Turnell, 58, an associate professor in economics at Sydney’s Macquarie University who had been serving as an advisor to Suu Kyi, was arrested by security forces at a hotel in Yangon just days after last year’s military takeover. He was sentenced in September to three years in prison for violating the country’s official secrets law and immigration law.
Suu Kyi and three of her former Cabinet members were convicted in the same trial, which was held in a closed court, with their lawyers barred by a gag order from talking about the proceedings.
Fellow Australian economist Tim Harcourt said in an email he was delighted to hear of his longtime friend’s release.
He thanked the Australian government, activists and Turnell’s friends and colleagues who had lobbied for his release and said he was looking forward to his return home to Sydney.
Aung San Suu Kyi denied allegations that she received $550,000 in bribes from Maung Weik, a Myanmar tycoon convicted of drug-trafficking.
“It’s a great relief to his wonderful wife Ha, his sister and father and all the family,” Harcourt said.
“Sean’s heart was with the people of Myanmar to help lift them out of poverty and help Myanmar reach its economic potential. He should never have been imprisoned for doing his professional duty as an economist involved in development economics,” he said.
Myanmar has been in turmoil since the takeover, which led to nationwide protests that the military government quashed with deadly force, triggering armed resistance that some United Nations experts now characterize as civil war.
Kubota was arrested July 30 by plainclothes police in Yangon after taking images and videos of a small flash protest against the military. He was convicted last month by the prison court of incitement for participating in the protest and other charges and sentenced to 10 years in prison.
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Since seizing power, the military has cracked down on the coverage of protests, raided media companies, detained dozens of journalists and revoked the licenses of at least a dozen outlets.
Most of those detained are being held on the incitement charge for allegedly causing fear, spreading false news or agitating against a government employee.
Some of the closed media outlets have continued operating without a license, and many Myanmar journalists are working underground, moving from one safe house to another, hiding in remote border regions or basing themselves in exile.
Kubota was the fifth foreign journalist detained in Myanmar after the military seized power. U.S. citizens Nathan Maung and Danny Fenster, who worked for local publications, and freelancers Robert Bociaga of Poland and Yuki Kitazumi of Japan were eventually deported before having to serve full prison sentences.
The photos showed the charred bodies of over 30 people in three burned-out vehicles who were reportedly shot by government troops as they fled combat.
Bowman, 56, a former British ambassador to Myanmar who had been running a business consultancy, was arrested with her husband, a Myanmar national, in Yangon in August. She was given a one-year prison term in September for failing to register her residence.
Myanmar did not release many details of the other prisoners being freed, but almost all would have been held on charges related to the protests. A section of Myanmar’s penal code makes it a crime to spread comments that create public unrest or fear or spread false news, and carries a penalty of up to three years in prison.
Those being released included Kyaw Tint Swe, a former union minister for the office of the State Counselor; Than Htay, a former member of the Union Election Commission; and Lae Lae Maw, a former chief minister of the Tanintharyi region, who had been sentenced to 30 years for corruption and had been in prison since 2020 under Suu Kyi’s government, MRTV announced.
Among the first set free from Yangon’s Insein prison were prominent author Maung Thar Cho, pro-democracy activist Mya Aye, and Myo Nyunt, the spokesperson of Suu Kyi’s NLD party, all of whom were arrested in the early morning hours of Feb. 1, 2021, the day the military seized power.
“I will always stand together with the people of Myanmar,” Mya Aye defiantly told the crowd outside the prison after he was released.
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