Tag: Burma

  • Investigate a massacre, go to prison

    This time it’s in Burma:

    Two Reuters journalists arrested in Myanmar while investigating a massacre of Rohingya Muslims have been found guilty of breaching the country’s Official Secrets Act and sentenced to seven years in prison.

    Wa Lone, 32, and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28, are being held in prison in Yangon after being arrested in December, in a landmark case that has prompted international outrage and been seen as a test of progress towards democracy in the south-east Asian country.

    (“Myanmar” was the choice of the generals, so I see using it as kind of like calling Senator Warren “Pocahontas.”)

    Press freedom advocates, the United Nations, the European Union and countries including the US, Canada and Australia had called for the men to be acquitted.

    The journalists were looking into the deaths of 10 Rohingyaat the hands of soldiers and Buddhist villagers in Inn Din, a village in the north of Rakhine state. After being invited to a dinner by officers, they were detained.

    Prosecutors accused the men of obtaining secret state documents, in breach of the Official Secrets Act. The journalists said they were framed by police who gave them the documents during the dinner, and that they were targeted for their reporting. Kyaw Soe Oo said that while being investigated he was deprived of sleep, forced to kneel for hours and had a black hood placed over his head.

    …

    Concerned by what was widely seen as a draconian attack by Myanmar authorities on the free press, dozens of journalists and activists marched in Yangon on Sunday in support of the men.

    The verdict was condemned by human rights activists, the UN, the US and Britain.

    …

    The verdict comes during a time of intense international scrutiny on Myanmar authorities following a damning UN report about the military’s treatment of the Rohingya, which it said amounted to ethnic cleansing. More than 700,000 Rohingya have fled Myanmar to bordering Bangladesh over the past year after a campaign of violence by the military.

    Last week, the UN said Myanmar army generals should be investigated and prosecuted for “gross human rights violations and serious violations of international humanitarian law”. In the report, which was rejected by the Myanmar government, de-facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi was criticised for failing to support the Rohingya.

    She’s not supporting the journalists, either.

  • Here’s that Buddha with his tunes

    Via Kenneth Wong SF.

  • The Buddha rocks out

    Two and a half years in prison for advertising a bar with a poster of Buddha in earphones.

    A New Zealander and two Burmese men have been found guilty of insulting religion in Myanmar over a poster promoting a drinks event depicting Buddha with headphones.

    Philip Blackwood, who managed the VGastro Bar in Yangon, was arrested in December along with bar owner Tun Thurein and colleague Htut Ko Ko Lwin.

    They have each been sentenced to two and a half years in jail.

    Burmese law makes it illegal to insult or damage any religion.

    From what I know of Siddhartha, he would think that’s a crock of shit.

    The poster, which was posted on Facebook to advertise a cheap drinks night, showed Buddha surrounded by psychedelic colours. It sparked an angry response online.

    Myanmar, also known as Burma, has seen growing Buddhist nationalism in recent years.

    And persecution of the Rohingya Muslim minority. Yay religion!!

    [T]he judge, Ye Lwin, said that though Blackwood apologised, he had “intentionally plotted to insult religious belief” when he uploaded the poster on Facebook, reported AFP news agency.

    Blackwood, 32, said he planned to appeal against the sentence.

    Speaking after sentencing outside the court before being bundled into a car, he said that he was “pretty disappointed” with his punishment, which was “more than the maximum sentence”.

    “I have said that I was sorry so many times,” he said. “It was nothing to do with me.”

    Before sentencing he said that he had removed the image and posted an apology when he realised it was being shared online and provoking outrage.

    Well that doesn’t cut it with religious nationalists aka theocrats. Revenge is theirs.

    Human Rights Watch Deputy Asia Director Phil Robertson said that the three men acted in a culturally insensitive way but should not have been sent to prison.

    “By using the Religion Act to criminalise these three individuals, rather than accepting an apology and dealing with it in another way, the government is, sort of, setting up more witch hunts against persons that these Buddhist groups view as being insulting to their religion,” he said.

    Is it really even “culturally insensitive”? Clearly it is according to the most zealous religious nationalists, but why take their pov as the normative one? I doubt that Burma is completely empty of more easygoing and kindly people who don’t object to friendly images of the Buddha.

    Also – did the BBC include the image so that we can judge it for ourselves? Of course it didn’t.