Myanmar courts sentence activists up to 37 years over election boycott protest

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BANGKOK (AP) — Courts in Myanmar have sentenced nine activists to up to 37 years in prison for involvement in a protest calling for a boycott of the elections last December, an activist group said Wednesday.

May Hnin, a spokesperson for the Anti-Junta Forces Coordination Committee-Mandalay, said eight members including prominent activist Htet Myat Aung were sentenced to 37 years on Tuesday by two courts in Mandalay, the country’s second-largest city, after being convicted under the electoral law and counterterrorism Law.

A ninth activist was sentenced to 27 years after being convicted under the counterterrorism law, she said.

Htet Myat Aung and the others were arrested days after staging a flash protest in downtown Mandalay on Dec. 3 calling on the public to reject the elections, abolish the military conscription law and release political prisoners detained after the military seized power from the elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi in 2021.

The activists will not appeal the verdicts because they do not believe the sentences would be overturned, May Hnin said.

She said she believed the military had imprisoned the activists for peacefully protesting in an attempt to instill fear among the public and secure its hold on power.

“These sentences are proof that a government that came to power through a sham election can never establish a federal democratic system,” May Hnin said.

The military-backed government has not publicly commented on the sentences.

The election law, enacted in July last year by the previous military government, imposes punishments of up to the death penalty for anyone who opposes or disrupts elections.

More than 200 people were charged under the law before the December election, in which the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party won a majority.

Opponents and independent observers said the election, which did not include major opposition parties, was neither free nor fair.

The 2021 army takeover triggered widespread popular opposition that has grown into a civil war.

The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a group that keeps detailed tallies of arrests and casualties linked to repression by the military, said 31,596 people had been arrested since the takeover, and more than 14,000 were in detention as of Tuesday.