US journalist Danny Fenster released from prison in Myanmar
The American journalist Danny Fenster has been released from prison in Myanmar, three days after he was sentenced to 11 years in jail for incitement and breaches of immigration and terrorism laws.
The former US ambassador to the UN Bill Richardson said Fenster had been released and handed over to him in Myanmar and would be soon on his way home via Qatar.
Fenster, the managing editor of the online magazine Frontier Myanmar, was convicted on Friday of spreading false or inflammatory information, contacting illegal organisations and violating visa regulations and sentenced to 11 years’ hard labour.
Richardson sad he negotiated Fenster’s release during a recent visit to Myanmar when he held face-toface meetings with the military leader who ousted the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February.
“Great news. I heard @DannyFenster is out,” Sonny Swe, the publisher of Frontier Myanmar, Fenster’s employer, said on Twitter.
A spokesman for Myanmar’s ruling military council did not respond immediately to separate requests for comment.
Fenster, 37, was arrested in May while trying to leave Myanmar, a country in chaos since a military coup in February.
He was the first western journalist sentenced to prison in recent years in Myanmar, where the coup against the elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi ended a decade of tentative steps towards democracy and triggered nationwide protests.
The military has arrested dozens of journalists among thousands detained after protests erupted nationwide.