Junta files terrorism charges against three detained journalists - lawyers

Family and friends had recently expected the reporters to be released as part of an amnesty

Published on Oct 27, 2021

D Myat Nyein (left), Pyae Phyo Aung (middle) and Win Naing Oo (right) (Facebook)

Three journalists jailed by the junta after reporting on the fallout from its February 1 coup are now facing terrorism charges that could see them sentenced to several years in prison, lawyers have told Myanmar Now.

The journalists are Win Naing Oo, a senior Channel Mandalay reporter, D Myat Nyein, a reporter with the now defunct Zayar Times in Sagaing Region, and Pyae Phyo Aung, who worked for the same outlet.

All three were initially charged under Section 505-A of the Penal Code for incitement. A Mandalay-based lawyer familiar with Win Naing Oo’s case said more details of the new charge against him would be released at his next hearing on November 5.

“I learnt from the court that his Section 505 charge had been changed to one under the Anti-Terrorism Law,” he said.

Win Naing Oo was due to appear at a hearing relating to his 505-A charge on Tuesday but did not show up even though other co-defendants in the case did, the lawyer added.

“Only the others charged with him under the same case file were… indicted with Section 505 charges. Win Naing Oo didn’t appear at the court,” he said.

Family members and friends of the three journalists had expected them to be released as part of a recent junta amnesty after it was announced that people charged under 505-A were due to be set free.

Another lawyer said police and court sources had revelaed that the Zayar Times reporters would face terrorism charges, but no detailed information was available yet.

“Only one charge has been filed to the court so far,” the lawyer said. “The terrorism charge is still being filed at the police station, according to my sources.”

D Myat Nyein, 25, has been in detention at Obo Prison in Mandalay since July 26 and has been attending hearings at a court set up inside the prison. His lawyer could not be reached for further details about the case against him.

Pyae Phyo Aung, 30, was arrested on October 11 and is due to attend his first hearing under the 505-A charge at a court in Sagaing Township on October 29.

Myanmar Now was unable to contact the No.1 police station in the town of Sagaing, where Pyae Phyo Aung is being held.

The Zayar Times was forced to stop publishing in late July after the junta began targeting its journalists. Its chief editor Saw Yan Paing and two other reporters there have gone into hiding to avoid arrest. It is unclear if the three journalists in hiding will also face terrorism charges.

“As journalists we have to have connections with both sides so we can hear both sides of the story. It’s really sad that we have to face such major charges,” said one of the Zayar Times journalists who is in hiding and did not want to be named.

The junta has arrested roughly 100 journalists since its February coup and at least 53 of them were still in detention as of October 1, according to Reporters Without Borders. Around 20 journalists were released as part of the amnesty in mid-October.

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Junta acknowledges soldiers’ payouts from military conglomerate still missing

Troops’ shares in the annual profits of MEHL are more than seven months late, with junta leadership ‘trying to come up with a plan’ to deliver the funds

Min Min

Published on May 20, 2022

Military parade in Naypyitaw on March 27, 2022 (EPA)

A spokesperson for the junta admitted at a press conference on Thursday that the Myanmar army has yet to pay soldiers the dividends they are owed from the 2021 revenue of military-owned conglomerate Myanma Economic Holdings Co, Ltd (MEHL).

The payouts from MEHL are based on profits generated annually and are typically allocated to troops in the months immediately following the end of the fiscal year in September, making it more than seven months late at the time of reporting.

Members of the armed forces are required to buy and maintain a stake in the conglomerate, the size of which is determined by their ranks and deducted annually from their salaries, according to officers who spoke to Myanmar Now after leaving the military following the February 2021 coup.

The investments range from 1.5m kyat (US$843) for low-ranking troops to at least 5m kyat ($2,810) for officers who are ranked at and above the position of lieutenant colonel.

Proclaimed military supporter Swe Zin Oo raised the issue of the missing MEHL payments to junta spokesperson Gen Zaw Min Tun at a press conference in Naypyitaw on Thursday.

“Soldiers and their families are expecting the dividends from the MEHL,” she said at the event.

Gen Zaw Min Tun replied that the military commander-in-chief Min Aung Hlaing was aware of the problem and that the military was “trying [their] best to come up with a plan.”

Cpt Ye Min Oo, who around one month ago left the frontlines and joined the Civil Disobedience Movement aimed at toppling the regime, speculated that the military had already exhausted the MEHL revenue and would be unable to recover it.

“I had to let go of those dividends when I defected from the army. I now think of that money as being spent for their funerals,” he told Myanmar Now from a liberated area where he has sought safety.

Another officer who defected around the same time, military nurse Cpt Khin Pa Pa Tun, said that she did not receive her share in the conglomerate’s profits before joining the resistance.

“Many people depend on that money and if they can’t pay it, the military is in incredibly bad shape,” she said, adding, “It’s going to fall apart soon.”

MEHL was founded in 1990 and includes around 50 business enterprises.

Many junta-owned enterprises have seen a decrease in profits since the coup, when the Myanmar public began a widespread boycott of military businesses.

According to a May 2021 financial statement by Kirin, the Japanese company which produced Myanmar Beer in collaboration with MEHL, sales plummeted by 46 percent during this period, forcing Kirin to end the partnership, its dealings with MEHL and withdraw from Myanmar.

Advocacy group Justice For Myanmar reported that Mytel, a telecommunications company jointly-owned by the Myanmar and Vietnamese militaries, also lost $25m in profits in the three months after the coup.

A military parade during Armed Forces Day events in the military capital of Naypyitaw in 2019 (EPA)

No sign of annual payout from Myanmar military conglomerate to soldiers

Troops obligated to buy shares in MEHL may be denied a slice of company profits this year, defecting officers say

Min Min

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Deputy commander among those killed in attack on junta base near Thai border

A number of soldiers who fled the attack on the Thay Baw Boe base are believed to have crossed the border into Thailand

Linn Htin

Published on May 20, 2022

The body of Maj Aung Nyein Chan, the deputy commander of the Thay Baw Boe base (KIC)

Anti-regime forces who overran a junta base in Kayin (Karen) State’s Myawaddy Township on Wednesday killed five soldiers, including the base’s deputy commander, according to an armed group that took part in the attack.

Maj Aung Nyein Chan, the deputy commander of the Thay Baw Boe base, was one of the casualties of the assault along with Lt Han Lin Tun and three other junta soldiers, a spokesperson for the Cobra Column told Myanmar Now.

“We found the body of the deputy commander while clearing the area around the base,” he said, adding that he believed that he had been killed by a sniper.

“The bullet found on the body looked like the kind our snipers use,” he said.

A joint force of troops from the Cobra Column and Brigade 6 of the Karen National Liberation Army (KNLA) seized control of the base late Wednesday after a full day of fierce fighting.

thay_baw_boe.jpeg

The Thay Baw Boe on May 19, a day after it was overrun by anti-regime forces (Cobra Column)

According to the Cobra Column spokesperson, two sergeants, a corporal, a lance corporal, and three privates were captured alive at the base, while others fled.

He said that at least some of those who escaped crossed the Moei River into neighbouring Thailand. Around 50 troops were believed to have been stationed at the base.

“Some of them fled to Thailand while we were clearing the area. We found a gun in the river and we also have proof that Thai soldiers helped them,” said the information officer.

The Thai military has not made any public statement regarding these claims.

The Voice of Spring, an organisation that tracks clashes around the country, reported that at least 10 Myanmar soldiers were being held by the Thai military in Mae Sot, a border town in Thailand’s Tak Province.

The raid on the base was led by Cobra Column commander Dar Baw, who is also the deputy commander of Squadron 2 of KNLA Brigade 6’s Battalion 27, and L Say Wah of the Karen National Defence Organization, according to a statement released by the Karen National Union (KNU) on May 20.

The KNU said that its armed wings and allies decided to seize control of the base because it was frequently used to fire heavy artillery at surrounding villages.

The military used airstrikes to defend the base. Three members of the anti-regime forces were killed and four, including Dar Baw, were injured.

The Thay Baw Boe base was under the control of the KNU until it was seized by Myanmar’s military in the 1990s.

Tensions have been high in eastern Karen State since March 7, when Brigade 6 ordered regime forces to leave Lay Kay Kaw, a town in Myawaddy Township, within three days so that civilians displaced by an earlier offensive could return to the area.

Since then, fighting has broken out on an almost daily basis throughout Brigade 6 territory, including in Myawaddy, Lay Kay Kaw, Waw Lay, Eu Kali Hta, Thay Baw Boe, and Balar Doh.

On March 21, KNLA troops overran a junta base in the village of Maw Khee, also located in Myawaddy Township, seizing a large cache of weapons and ammunition.

Members of the Cobra Column, an anti-regime group that helped seize control of a junta base in KNLA Brigade 6 territory on May 18, stand behind captured regime soldiers and seized weapons and ammunition (Cobra Column)

KNU seizes control of junta base near Thai-Myanmar border

The Karen armed group and allied anti-regime forces successfully overran the base after a full day of fierce fighting

Linn Htin

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Myanmar junta accuses Malaysia of ‘abetting terrorism’ by meeting National Unity Government

A junta spokesperson says the military council ‘strongly object[ed]’ to the meeting

Sa Thant Zin

Published on May 20, 2022

Saifuddin Abdullah, the Malaysian minister of foreign affairs, is seen with Zin Mar Aung, the NUG’s foreign affairs minister, during their meeting on May 14 (Saifuddin Abdullah / Facebook)

Myanmar’s military council issued multiple objections to a meeting held last week between personnel from the Malaysian government and the National Unity Government (NUG), a junta spokesperson said in a press conference on Thursday.

On May 14, Malaysia’s foreign minister Saifuddin Abdullah met with Zin Mar Aung, who holds the same position within the NUG—a cabinet formed and endorsed by elected lawmakers ousted in the February 2021 coup. They reportedly discussed issues concerning humanitarian aid, as well as the establishment of a direct relationship between his administration and the NUG.

The informal meeting was held in Washington DC days after the closing of the ASEAN-US Special Summit in the American capital. Myanmar’s junta is barred from attending such events and, more than one year after staging the coup, has not obtained widespread recognition by the international community.

Gen Zaw Min Tun, the military council’s deputy minister of information, repeatedly referred to the NUG as a “terrorist organisation” during Thursday’s press conference and suggested that collaboration with the administration amounted to “abetting terrorism.”

“We strongly object to such actions,” he said.

According to the general, the junta sent a letter to the Malaysian ministry of foreign affairs warning members of the government and parliament not to engage in such a meeting again, and relayed the same message to officials at Malaysia’s embassy in Yangon.

The junta-run foreign affairs ministry released its own statement condemning a meeting between US State Department officials and NUG representatives including Zin Mar Aung on May 12, suggesting that “engagements with illegal, unlawful and terrorist entities” including the NUG “could abet terrorism and violence in the country.”

As the Myanmar military continues to battle resistance forces on multiple fronts, coup leader Min Aung Hlaing has been trying since April to organise his own meetings with ethnic armed forces, which commence on Friday.

His invitation was rejected by groups including the All Burma Students Democratic Front, Arakan Army, Chin National Front, Kachin Independence Organisation, Karen National Union and the Karenni National Progressive Party.

In this week’s press conference, Gen Zaw Min Tun dismissed any refusals to attend the talks as an attempt to “sabotage” the military’s so-called peace efforts.

Representatives from the NUG and its People’s Defence Force, as well as other resistance groups formed in the wake of the coup were not invited to meet with the military chief.

According to the military, the 10 organisations confirmed to be attending individual talks with Min Aung Hlaing include the Arakan Liberation Party, Democratic Karen Buddhist Army, Karen National Liberation Army-Peace Council, Lahu Democratic Union, New Mon State Party, Pa-O National Liberation Organisation, and the Restoration Council of Shan State, as well as the National Democratic Alliance Army (Mongla), Shan State Progress Party and the United Wa State Party.