Yangon releases detainees, move dubbed cynical ploy

YANGON, January 12, 2007 : Myanmar’s junta has released five political prisoners at a time when the country’s pariah regime is coming under increasing pressure to implement democratic reforms and show respect for human rights, officials and commentators said Thursday.
Min Ko Naing, Ko Ko Gyi, Htay Kywe, Min Zeya and Pyone Cho, leaders of the 88 Generation Students dissident group who have been under detention since September, were released late Wednesday from the Aung Thapyay camp outside Yangon.
Htay Kywe said their releases had been “unconditional”.
The five 88 Students leaders were detained for interrogation and were never officially charged.
Htay Kywe said they had been questioned about their international connections. “All of us told the authorities that the country needs national reconciliation and peaceful discussion to resolve the prevailing conflict,” he said.
The 88 Generation Students, made up mostly of former students who participated in the 1988 pro-democracy movement, is one of the few active dissent groups operating in military-run Myanmar.
The group last year organised non-violent political activities, such as prayer protests and signature campaigns, to draw attention to the ongoing detention of opposition leader and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who has been under house arrest in Yangon for the past three years.
The release of the five dissidents comes at a time when Myanmar is under growing international pressure to free Suu Kyi and push through democratic reforms, giving rise to some question about the timing of their release.
“This looks like nothing but a cynical ploy to stop the UN Security Council from taking action,” said Aung Din, policy director of New York-based US Campaign for Burma.
The UN Security Council is weighing its first-ever resolution on Myanmar this year after agreeing to place the South-East Asian country on its permanent agenda for the first time in history in September.
Myanmar, a member of the Association of South-East Asia Nations (Asean), has also come under increasing pressure from its neighbours to resolve its political impasse that has seen Suu Kyi’s democratically elected National League for Democracy party blocked from assuming power by the ruling junta for the past 17 years.
Yesterday Asean foreign ministers who met in Cebu, Philippines, once again rebuked Myanmar for the slow pace of democratic reforms as they began preparatory meetings ahead of a leaders’ summit starting tomorrow.