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Myanmar nationals in Japan protest against Myanmar’s military coup outside the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo on February 3, 2021. Photo: Reuters

Myanmar police file charges against Aung San Suu Kyi for violating import-export law: document

  • Police have accused Aung San Suu Kyi of breaching an import-export law, and sought her detention until February 15
  • Toppled President Win Myint was also charged with offences under the Natural Disaster Management law, a police document said
Myanmar
Agencies
A Myanmar court has granted a police request to detain ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi until February 15 for illegally importing and using communications equipment, members of her National League for Democracy (NLD) party said on Wednesday.

Myanmar’s army seized power on Monday, detaining Suu Kyi and cutting short a transition to democracy in a takeover that has drawn condemnation from the United States and other Western countries.

A police request to a court detailing the accusations against 75-year-old Suu Kyi said walkie-talkie radios had been found in a search of her home in the capital, Naypyidaw. It said the radios were imported illegally and used without permission, violating the country’s import-export law.

In Myanmar, noisy ‘protests’ erupt against military coup

The document reviewed on Wednesday requested Suu Kyi’s detention “in order to question witnesses, request evidence and seek legal counsel after questioning the defendant”.

The charges against Suu Kyi appear to carry a maximum sentence of two years in prison. The charge sheets indicate the unregistered walkie-talkies were for use by Suu Kyi’s bodyguards.

“We have got reliable information that Dakhinathiri court has given a 14-day remand from February 1 to February 15 against Daw Aung San Suu Kyi under the charge of violating the import/export law,” Kyi Toe, the press officer of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD) party, wrote on his official Facebook page.

A separate document showed ousted President Win Myint was charged for breaching the Disaster Management Law over an election campaign rally that police say violated Covid-19 restrictions.

01:16

Myanmar junta leaders hold first meeting of military government the day after staging coup

Myanmar junta leaders hold first meeting of military government the day after staging coup
Myanmar’s new leader Min Aung Hlaing said the military government is planning an investigation into alleged fraud in last year’s elections and will also prioritise the Covid-19 outbreak and the economy, the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper said on Wednesday.

Min Aung Hlaing announced the moves on Tuesday at the first meeting of his new government in the capital, the newspaper said.

The military has said one of its reasons for ousting the elected civilian government of Suu Kyi was because it failed to properly investigate its allegations of alleged widespread electoral irregularities. The state Union Election Commission declared four days before the military takeover that there were no significant problems with the vote.

The military has announced it will hold power under a state of emergency for a year, and then hold elections whose winner will take over government.

Aung San Suu Kyi is greeted by supporters over the fence of her house as she is set free in Yangon on November 13, 2010. File photo: EPA-EFE

The coup was a dramatic backslide for Myanmar, which had been making progress toward democracy, and highlighted the extent to which the generals have ultimately maintained control in in the Southeast Asian country.

The takeover also marked a shocking fall from power for Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who had lived under house arrest between 1989 and 2010 as she tried to push her country toward democracy and then became its de facto leader after her party won elections in 2015.

Suu Kyi had been a fierce critic of the army during her years in detention. But after her shift from democracy icon to politician, she worked with the generals and even defended their crackdown on Rohingya Muslims, damaging her international reputation.

Aung San Suu Kyi, her NLD party and the Myanmar military behind coup

Amid the coup and the military’s unproven claims of voter fraud, the United Nations and others called on the army to respect the country’s election results from a poll in November.

The US and European Union threatened to impose sanctions. However, the UN Security Council has yet to agree on a shared position.

The Group of Seven condemned the coup on Wednesday.

“We call upon the military to immediately end the state of emergency, restore power to the democratically-elected government, to release all those unjustly detained and to respect human rights and the rule of law,” the G7 said in a statement.

04:08

'Worst nightmare': violence feared after Myanmar military coup

'Worst nightmare': violence feared after Myanmar military coup

Meanwhile, calls for a peaceful civil disobedience campaign in Myanmar gathered pace on Wednesday after the US formally declared the military’s takeover a coup and vowed further penalties for the generals behind the putsch.

Doctors and medical staff at multiple hospitals across the country announced on Wednesday they were donning red ribbons and walking away from all non-emergency work to protest against the coup.

“Our main goal is to accept only the government we elected,” said Aung San Min, head of a 100-bed hospital in Gangaw district.

Medical staff make a three-finger salute at the Yangon General Hospital on February 3, 2021. Photo: AFP

Some medical teams posted pictures on social media wearing red ribbons – NLD’s colours – and raising a three-finger salute, a protest gesture used by democracy activists in neighbouring Thailand, while some have chosen to bypass work altogether.

“My protest starts today by not going to the hospital … I have no desire to work under the military dictatorship,” said Nor Nor Wint Wah, a doctor in Mandalay.

“We want to show the world we are totally against military dictatorship and we want our elected government and leader back,” said Zun Ei Phyu, a doctor in Yangon. “We want to show them we will follow only our elected government. Not the military.”

Activists were announcing their campaigns on a Facebook group called “Civil Disobedience Movement” which by Wednesday afternoon had more than 150,000 followers within 24 hours of its launch.

The clatter of pots and pans – and the honking of car horns – also rang out across Yangon on Tuesday evening after calls for protest went out on social media.

Online, the hashtags #SaveMyanmar and #RejectMilitaryCoup began trending, with some Myanmar users on social media expressing fears that the military could assert more control over the people by using paid rioters to claim that the peaceful resistance had turned violent.

In Tokyo, thousands of people took to the streets on Wednesday in protest against the military coup and called for the international community to stand beside Suu Kyi.

“Free Burma. Free Aung San Suu Kyi,” protesters chanted in front of the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo, as they held up photographs of Suu Kyi and posters with messages written in English and Japanese.

“The response from the international community is important. We would like the Japanese government to voice its opinion more,” said Kyaw Kyaw Soe, a senior member of the Union of Myanmar Citizen Association and one of the organisers of the rally.

He said he handed a written request to an official of the ministry’s Southeast and Southwest Asian Affairs Department.

Myanmar nationals in Japan shout slogans during a protest held in front of Japan’s Foreign Ministry in Tokyo on February 3, 2021. Photo: EPA-EFE

The Tokyo-based group requested that the Japanese government use its “political, diplomatic and economic power” to restore democracy in Myanmar.

“The military takeover has made it difficult for people who want to return to Myanmar from Japan to actually go back,” Kyaw Kyaw Soe said. “I think they took our freedom away from us.”

Myanmar fitness coach dances to Indonesian protest anthem as coup unfolds

Over 2,000 people joined the rally in the Japanese capital after organisers urged people from Myanmar to gather in protest on social media.

Khin Hnin Aye, who has lived in Japan for over 20 years, took a late-night bus from Ishikawa Prefecture, central Japan, to join the rally.

“I’m worried about my home country, and worried especially about the young people there,” she said. “I want people in Japan to know about what is happening in Myanmar and lend a hand.”

Reporting by Reuters, AP, AFP, Kyodo

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: suu kyi accused of import breach
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