The Burmese junta is tightening its control over Aung San Suu Kyi: the former leader was sentenced on Monday to an additional six years in prison during a river trial, denounced as political by the international community. The 77-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner, who had previously been sentenced to a total of 11 years in prison, was found guilty on four counts of corruption.
He appeared in good health at the military court, according to a source close to the case, he did not pronounce himself after the sentence was read.
This is an “affront to justice and the rule of law”, reacted a spokesman for the US State Department, calling for the “immediate release of Aung San Suu Kyi and all those unjustly detained, including elected representatives democratically”.
The head of EU diplomacy, Josep Borrell, for his part denounced the “unjust” sentence of the Burmese junta against Aung San Suu Kyi and asked the Burmese regime in a tweet “to release her immediately and unconditionally, as well as to all political prisoners. , and respect the will of the people”.
“The fabricated trials by the junta, the torture of detainees and the execution of activists amply illustrate the disregard for the lives of the people of Burma,” the NGO Human Rights Watch said in a statement, calling Aung San Suu Kyi’s sentence “illegitimate”.
He faces decades in prison.
Detained during the military coup of February 1, 2021, Aung San Suu Kyi was placed in solitary confinement in a Naypyidaw prison at the end of June 2021. It is in this prison in the capital that her trial, which began a few years ago, continues. more than a year ago, behind closed doors. Her lawyers are also prohibited from speaking to the press and international organizations.
He is in the crosshairs of a multitude of crimes: violation of a law on state secrets dating from colonial times, electoral fraud, sedition, corruption… He risks spending decades in prison.
At the end of April, the Nobel laureate was sentenced to five years in prison under the anti-corruption law, for having received $600,000 and more than 11 kilos of gold in bribes from the former minister in charge of the Yangon region.
She had previously been tried for illegally importing and possessing walkie-talkies, violating coronavirus restrictions and inciting public disorder.
Source: BFM TV
