The decision to
sentence two Reuters reporters to seven years in prison for violating a state
secrets act has sent shockwaves through the journalism community in Myanmar,
the BBC's Nick Beake writes.
For the journalists
of Yangon this is personal. Many were close friends of the jailed Reuters
reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo.
And many now feel
one false move and they could be joining them in the notorious Insein prison
here in Myanmar's former capital.
"Insane"
is how the jail is pronounced and for many in the press, it reflects a chaotic
legal farce which has played out over the past nine months.
One that's
culminated in two young journalists being found to have been useful to
"enemies of the state" and handed a seven year prison sentence.
Not that their wives
regret their choice of careers. Not for one moment.
"I'm so proud
of my husband", Kyaw Soe Oo's wife, Chit Su Win, told a packed press
conference in a downtown hotel.
"I am proud
that I am the wife of a journalist."
Source: Via Star Online: Wives of jailed journalists ask Myanmar
for mercy https://youtu.be/GnkfInSqMdE
'Doesn't
Daddy love me anymore?'
But what about those
in Myanmar who agree with the judge that they harmed the country by seeking
sensitive, security information?
Pan Ei Mon, who gave
birth to her first child last month while her husband Wa Lone was in jail
replied: "People are entitled to their own opinions. They have never gone
through what we're going through. I just hope it never happens to them."
And how about Aung
San Suu Kyi? The country's Nobel peace prize-winning leader had accused the
pair of breaking the Official Secrets Act before the verdict had even been
delivered.
"I loved and
respected her so much," Pan Ei Mon explained. "But she said our
husbands were not reporters because they violated the nation's secrets, and I
am very devastated by that."
Ms Suu Kyi used to
champion the rights of journalists. She certainly benefited from their coverage
of her long fight for democracy while she suffered years of house arrest.
When it was time for
my own question to the wives, I asked what their message to Ms Suu Kyi would be
- as someone who the Burmese authorities had also kept apart from the man she
loved (her late British husband Michael Aris).
Chit Su Win told me
she'd rather address her mother to mother.
"My daughter
asks me - doesn't daddy love me anymore? Doesn't daddy live with us
anymore?"
"As a mother, I
feel devastated. I tell her daddy is working. I try to be strong for my
daughter. I feel very depressed, but I steel myself, because if I am depressed,
who will care for my daughter?"
The
Rohingya investigation
As the mother of the
nation, Ms Suu Kyi generated huge hope when her National League for Democracy
(NLD) party triumphed in free elections in 2012, after five decades of brutal
military rule.
History will judge
how misplaced that hope may have been. What's for sure in 2018, hope is a
commodity that's fading fast.
Not least because of
the chorus of international condemnation of Myanmar over the army's persecution
of Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state - the very story the Reuters pair were
investigating at the time of their arrest.
They continue to
argue they were framed because they were getting dangerously close to the truth
of a massacre of 10 Rohingya men in the village of Inn Din.
One of the many
painful ironies of this case is that the army later admitted its soldiers were
culpable.
The military's wider
crackdown on what it called Bengali "terrorists" last autumn -
following attacks on security posts - forced three quarters of a million
Rohingya into neighbouring Bangladesh. They remain there in the sprawling and
depressing camps of Cox's Bazaar.
Who are
the Rohingya? https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-41566561
The story
not being talked about in Myanmar https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-41510635
Last week in a
blistering assessment, UN inspectors said the top generals should stand trial
for genocide and accused Ms Suu Kyi of failing to use her "moral
authority" to stop the violence.
Now Ms Suu Kyi's accused
of failing to stand up for reporters, as well as the Rohingya.
"All of you are
at risk," Khin Maung Zaw, the leading lawyer for the Reuters pair told the
hushed room of journalists back at the press conference.
He declared the
verdict a black day for Myanmar and a major setback for a free press and the
country's transition to democracy.
Fears and
tears
Many wonder who will
be next.
Aung Naing Soe is
one Burmese journalist who knows what it's like to feel the heat of the regime
in the new Suu Kyi’s era. He has served a two month sentence earlier this year
for operating a drone near the parliament in the capital Naypyidaw.
"It's really
heartbreaking for us to come and cover this kind of event" he tells me.
"I do not want
to see tears from the wives of these journalists anymore. We have covered a lot
of heartbreaking things but this is more personal. They are my colleagues, my
friends."
He's worried that
the public has been poisoned against journalists by online campaigns which
characterise them as "betrayers of the state" and that there will be
no popular backlash against any further attacks on the freedom of the press.
In some countries,
Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo would have been given a prize for their investigative
journalism. Not here. Not in Suu Kyi's Myanmar.
As State Counsellor,
a role she created for herself because the country's 2008 Constitution denies
her the presidency, Ms Suu Kyi runs Myanmar's NLD civilian government.
She has the power to
issue a pardon and set these journalists free. If she's even considering that,
she certainly hasn't shown it.
Su Myat Mon is a
reporter who focuses on women's rights and social affairs.
"I was
extremely disappointed with the verdict and with the NLD too. They're a
democratic government. They used to believe the media was for something, that
it did something positive for democracy."
Is she scared to be
a journalist in Myanmar now?
"It does make
me frightened," she replies.
"I can be
arrested at any time if the government doesn't like my reports. This verdict
affects me: my emotions and the work I do."
Would you consider
giving up the job?, I venture. Su Myat Mon looks at me straight in the eye:
"I love this job. I may fear being arrested, but I still have my spirit.
And, don't forget, there's nothing wrong with being a journalist. It is not a
crime."
Source: BBC
Source: BBC