In a separate procedure, Danny Fenster, held since May by the Burmese junta, is also charged for terrorism and sedition. It risks prison for life.
Le Monde with AFP
Burmese repression takes a judicial dimension. An American journalist, detained since May by the Junta in Burma, was sentenced to eleven years in prison, reported on Friday, November 12, his employer, the Frontier Myanmar media. “Frontier Myanmar is deeply disappointed by the decision today to condemn his editor, Danny Fenster, to prison sentences of a total of eleven years,” the media said in a statement.
The journalist was pursued for three charges: incentive to dissent, illegal association, violation of the Immigration Act. In a separate procedure, it is also indicted for terrorism and sedition. He risks prison for life.
Danny Fenster was arrested on May 24, nearly four months after the military coup against the former civilian director Aung San Suu Kyi, at Rangoun International Airport while attempting to leave the country .
“Journalism is not a crime”
Since his arrest, he is detained at the Insein Prison in Rangoun, with many political prisoners. His trial is held in camera in the presence of the penitentiary establishment. “Its maintenance in detention is unacceptable. Journalism is not a crime,” recently reacted a spokesman for American diplomacy.
Burma has been experiencing dark hours since the Putsch of the $ 1, which ended a ten-year democratic parenthesis. The Plan pursues a bloody repression against its opponents with more than 1,250 civilians killed and more than 7,000 in detention, according to the Association of Assistance to Political Prisoners (AAPP), a local NGO that reports cases of torture, rape and extrajudicial executions.
The press is strangled by the junta, which tries to strengthen its control over information, limiting access to the Internet and canceling the media licenses.