In a rare gesture indicating that the pressures exerted on it are perhaps not without effects, the military junta in power in Burma released, Thursday, November 17, nearly 6,000 prisoners, including several foreigners. The latter were prominent detainees, victims of the hostage diplomacy practiced by the regime, which indicated that it had pardoned them as a pledge of ” good will “.
Australian Sean Turnell, former economic adviser to imprisoned ex-leader Aung San Suu Kyi, imprisoned shortly after the military coup of 1er February 2021, was released after six hundred and fifty days of detention. He was sentenced in September to a three-year prison sentence for disclosing state secrets.
Britain’s Vicky Bowman, who was Britain’s ambassador to Myanmar between 2002 and 2006 and was sentenced to a year in prison in September on the pretext of violating immigration laws, has been released; her husband, the Burmese contemporary artist Htein Lin, to whom the judges had imposed the same sentence, is also released from prison, without it being known yet whether he will be authorized to leave the country.
Young Japanese press photographer Toru Kubota, arrested in July while covering an anti-government protest, has been released after being recently sentenced to ten years in prison. The fourth foreign prisoner is an American of Burmese origin, botanist by profession, Kyaw Htay Oo. He was released after fourteen months of incarceration for terrorism.
“No substantial change” in policy
The releases, which took place as part of amnesties granted on National Day, also involved some 5,774 prisoners, including 600 women, according to a military spokesman. The latter specified that three former ministers of Mme Suu Kyi were also pardoned.
The four detainees were immediately expelled and put on a plane for Bangkok, where they arrived Thursday during the day. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, present in the Thai capital for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting, which brings together a group of heads of state – including Chinese President Xi Jinping, his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron and US Vice President Kamala Harris said they spoke with Sean Turnell. “He is doing wellhe reported. He even joked, apologizing to me for not having been able to vote in the legislative elections in May [à l’issue desquelles M. Albanese est devenu premier ministre]. »
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