2 reporters charged with obtaining state secrets
They were probing existence of a mass grave in Myanmar.
BANGKOK — Two journalists for the Reuters news agency were formally charged in Myanmar with obtaining state secrets, prosecutors said Wednesday, in a case seen as a key test of the country’s nascent political freedoms.
The reporters, U Wa Lone and U Kyaw Soe Oo, have been accused of violating the Official Secrets Act, a law dating to the British colonial period that carries a maximum punishment of 14 years in prison.
The journalists were brought to court in Yangon, Myanmar’s commercial capital, where they were arrested Dec. 12, almost immediately after being given unidentified documents by members of the police.
Before their arrest, the journalists had been investigating the existence of a mass grave in Rakhine state, where a military campaign against Rohingya Muslims has sent more than 655,000 members of the persecuted minority fleeing to Bangladesh over the past 4 1/2 months.
While the United States and the United Nations have called the campaign against the Rohingya ethnic cleansing, the Myanmar government has blocked independent investigators and journalists from the epicenter of violence, making it difficult to gather proof of atrocities.
Negotiating a scrum of journalists gathered in front of the Insein courthouse in Yangon on Wednesday morning, Wa Lone struck a defiant pose, raising his cuffed hands and later flashing a thumbs-up sign.
“We are not doing anything wrong,” Kyaw Soe Oo told journalists after the hearing. “Please help us by uncovering the truth.”
A lawyer for both journalists, U Than Zaw Aung, said that Wa Lone is suffering from a hernia and back pain but has received no medical treatment while in detention. The next court appearance for his clients will be Jan. 23, he said.
“The situation is very unclear,” said Ma Pan Ei Mon, Wa Lone’s wife. “I’m hoping all the time that he will be released soon.”
In a statement, Stephen J. Adler, president and editorin-chief of Reuters, called the move to prosecute the reporters “a wholly unwarranted, blatant attack on press freedom,” adding, “We believe time is of the essence and we continue to call for Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo’s prompt release.”
The United States and the European Union both called for the men’s release Wednesday.
Although Myanmar now has a civilian government, led by Aung San Suu Kyi, the military that ruled the country for nearly half a century still controls the most important levers of power. The Tatmadaw, as the military is known, runs the Home Ministry, which administers Myanmar’s internal affairs, including its prisons and police.
Human rights groups have accused the police of entrapping the two Reuters journalists by giving them documents that were then deemed state secrets. Pan Ei Mon said her husband never had a chance to look at the papers before he was arrested.
Myanmar’s elected civilian government has been accused of acquiescing to a crackdown on the media that belies the commitment to democratic values once espoused by Suu Kyi’s governing party, the National League for Democracy. Since the party took power from a quasi-civilian administration in 2016, at least 32 journalists have been charged with various crimes, according to We Support Journalists, a local media watchdog.
Many of the journalists have been imprisoned after reporting on abuses taking place in Myanmar’s ethnic frontier lands, where the military has been fighting various ethnic guerrilla groups for decades.
Groups have accused police of entrapping the journalists.