Court also sentences Suu Kyi’s Australian economic adviser, 3 former Cabinet members on same charges
ANKARA
A military junta court in Myanmar sentenced ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi and her Australian economic adviser to three years in prison on charges of violation of the official secret act, local media reported on Thursday.
Suu Kyi and Australian professor Sean Turnell were convicted by Pyinmana District Court in violation of the official secret act after 18 months of hearings, local news agency Myanmar Now reported.
The court also handed the same prison sentence to Suu Kyi’s former Cabinet members, including Finance Minister Kyaw Win, his successor Soe Win, and deputy minister Set Aung on same charges.
Earlier this month, a military court sentenced Suu Kyi to three years in prison on charges of election fraud.
Suu Kyi has now been facing conviction for 23 years in prison since the military overthrew her government in February last year.
In June, the military regime moved her to prison and placed her in solitary confinement.
After her ouster in a military coup on Feb. 24, 2021, Suu Kyi was placed under house arrest until April this year, when she was shifted to an unknown location, believed to be Naypyitaw Prison in Myanmar’s capital.
She is facing over a dozen charges, including corruption, for which she received a five-year prison sentence in April.
Suu Kyi previously spent around 15 years under house arrest during different junta regimes in the Buddhist-majority country.
Suu Kyi has been imprisoned for the second time since 2009. The then-junta regime had transferred her to Yangon’s Insein Prison for four months earlier that year for “violating the rules of her house arrest.”
Suu Kyi’s government was deposed in a military coup last year after winning the national elections in November 2020.
The coup was met with widespread civic unrest as people denounced her removal and military rule. The junta repressed protests violently, despite UN warnings that the country had descended into civil war.
The junta forces have since killed more than 1,500 people in a crackdown on dissent, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a local monitoring group.
