A court set up by the Myanmar military coup has sentenced the deposed leader and Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi to five years in prison for one of the corruption cases she is accused of.
Suu Kyi, 76, has been detained since the early hours of the military coup on February 1, 2021 and had already been sentenced to six years in prison. In this trial, which took place in the capital Naypyitaw, she was accused of accepting bribes of $ 600,000 and 11.4 kilos of gold from the former governor of Rangoon. Phyo Min Theinwho testified against the elected leader in October.
The trial was closed to the public and Nobel Peace Prize lawyers were banned from talking to journalists and international organizations. Against the winner of the 2015 and 2020 elections there are numerous accusations, from the violation of a law on state secrets dating back to the colonial era to electoral fraud, from sedition to corruption. At the end of the judicial proceedings, which according to observers only aim to permanently exclude her from political life, she risks being sentenced to dozens and dozens of years in prison.
Coup d’état in Myanmar, the army deployed in the streets of the capital Naypyidaw
Suu Kyi is isolated in the same residence in which she has been held since the day of the military coup that ended a decade of democratic transition. Many of her collaborators were heavily condemned: the death penalty for a former parliamentarian, 75 years in prison for a former minister, 20 years for other members of the deposed government. Others went into exile or went underground.
The military coup has plunged Myanmar into chaos. Armed resistance was organized in some regions. According to observers on the spot, around 1,800 civilians were killed by the army and more than 13,000 were arrested.