The military junta is tightening its grip on Aung San Suu Kyi: the former leader was sentenced on Wednesday to an additional five years in prison after a river trial, denounced as political by the international community.
The Nobel Peace Prize winner, who had already been inflicted in recent months with a six-year prison sentencewas convicted this time under the anti-corruption law.
“She remains under house arrest. I don’t know if she asked to appeal,” junta spokesman Zaw Min Tun told Agence France-Presse.
According to local media, she will appeal the conviction.
In good health, according to a source familiar with the matter interviewed earlier this week, Aung San Suu Kyi, 76, has been detained since the military coup of 1er February 2021, which ended a decade of democratic transition in Myanmar.
She is targeted for a multitude of offenses (violation of a law on state secrets which dates from the colonial era, electoral fraud, sedition, corruption, etc.) and risks decades in prison in total.
In this part, the military regime accuses him of having received 600,000 dollars and more than eleven kilos of gold in bribes from the former minister responsible for the Rangoon region Phyo Min Thein.
The latter testified in court, claiming to have paid him the gold and silver in exchange for his support. Aung San Suu Kyi, for her part, rejected these allegations.
This is the first corruption case brought against the former leader. In all, a dozen counts of corruption have been brought against her.
The Nobel Prize winner is serving the beginning of her sentence under house arrest, in the place where she has been held incommunicado for more than a year and where she must remain for the duration of her trial.
The latter is held behind closed doors in the capital, Naypyidaw, and his lawyers are not allowed to speak to the press and international organisations.
Political trial
Many observers around the world have denounced this procedure, which they believe is solely motivated by political considerations: definitively excluding Aung San Suu Kyi, daughter of the hero of independence and big winner of the 2015 and 2020 elections, from the political arena.
“The political motivation is obvious. This is another sordid step in the consolidation of the coup d’état, ”denounces David Mathieson, an analyst specializing in the country.
“It is possible that she will end her days in prison”, given her advanced age, notes Phil Robertson, deputy director of the Asia division of the NGO Human Rights Watch. “Destroying Myanmar democracy means first getting rid of it, the junta leaves nothing to chance. »
France condemned with “the greatest firmness” the new prison sentence imposed on the former leader “after arbitrary legal proceedings”.
A spokeswoman for the head of European diplomacy, Josep Borrell, denounced a “politically motivated” trial, “a new step towards the dismantling of the rule of law” and “another flagrant violation of human rights in Myanmar”. .
Several relatives of the Nobel Prize winner have been sentenced to heavy sentences: capital punishment for a former parliamentarian, 75 years in prison for a former minister, 20 years for one of his collaborators. Others went into exile or went into hiding.
Some of these deposed deputies formed a parallel “national unity government” (NUG) in an attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the junta.
But, 15 months after the coup, the NUG does not control any territory and has not been recognized by any foreign government.
Aung San Suu Kyi remains a very popular figure in Myanmar, even if her international image has been damaged by her inability to defend the Muslim Rohingya minority.
She has completely disappeared from the radar since her arrest, only appearing in rare snaps taken by state media in court.
Many opponents of the military regime believe that their fight must go beyond winning the Nobel Prize to try to end the generals’ grip on Myanmar’s politics and economy.
Militias have taken up arms against the junta in several regions of the country, going against the principle of non-violence advocated by Aung San Suu Kyi.
Junta leader Min Aung Hlaing last week called for peace talks with ethnic rebel factions that control large swaths of the territory and have been battling the military for decades.
The February 2021 coup plunged the country into chaos. Nearly 1,800 civilians were killed by security forces and more than 13,000 arrested, according to a local NGO.