Blogger jailed for 20 years over poem that mocked Burmese dictator<

Blogger jailed for 20 years over poem that mocked Burmese dictator
Myanmar Senior General Than Shwe

The poem spelled out "Power Crazy Senior General Than Shwe", referring to the Burmese dictator (above)
Richard Lloyd Parry, Asia Editor

A young blogger and a writer who disguised an attack on the country’s dictator in the form of a love poem have received heavy jail sentences, in the latest blow to opponents of Burma’s military dictatorship.

Nay Myo Kyaw, a 28-year old man who blogged under the name Nay Phone Latt, was sentenced to 20 years and six months in jail by a court in Rangoon.

The poet, Saw Wai, received a two year sentence for an eight-line Valentine’s Day verse published in a popular magazine. Even the lawyer representing the two men, Aung Thein, has been sent down for four months for “contempt of court” during his defence.

They join more than 2,000 other political prisoners in Burma’s jails, half of whom have been incarcerated since last September’s “Saffron Revolution”, when tens of thousands of Buddhist monks and political activists took to the streets in a failed uprising against the junta.
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The advocacy organisation, Reporters Without Borders, said: “The authorities have imposed an extraordinarily severe punishment on Nay Phone Latt just for using the Internet. This shocking sentence is meant to terrify those who go online in an attempt to elude the dictatorship’s ubiquitous control of news and information, and we call for his immediate release. Saw Wai, for his part, is being made to pay for his impertinence and courage as a committed poet.”

Mr Saw Wai’s poem, entitled ‘14th February’, was ostensibly a Valentine’s Day verse published last January in a popular weekly magazine. “You have to be in love truly, madly, deeply and then you can call it real love,” it read. “Millions of people who know how to love, please clap your hands of gilded gold and laugh out loud.”

But the first word of each line spelled out a pithier message about the leader of the country’s military government: “Power Crazy Senior General Than Shwe”. Mr Saw Wai was arrested the next day and charged with harming “public tranquility”.

Mr Nay Phone Latt is a youth member of the National League for Democracy, the opposition party led by the Nobel Peace Prize Winner, Aung San Suu Kyi, whose victory in 1990 elections has never been acknowledged by the generals.

He is the owner of three internet cafés in the capital, Rangoon, and his Burmese language blog, which was not explicitly political, described the difficulties of day to day life in Rangoon.

But he was regarded as an inspirational figure among Burmese bloggers in general, who contributed greatly to the “Saffron Revolution” by e-mailing across the world digital photographs of the massive anti-government demonstrations and the brutal crackdown which suppressed them.

As well as crimes against 'public tranquility', Mr Nay Phone Latt was charged with offences under the country’s video and electronics laws.

“I was expecting him to get 10 or 12 years in prison at the most,” his mother, Aye Aye Than, said. “I never imagined he would get this much. The authorities have been excessively cruel with him.”

She was not allowed to attend the closed hearing in Insein Prison, a huge British colonial structure in north-west Rangoon, where many political prisoners are held.

Bo Kyi, of the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a Burmese exile group based in Thailand, said: “Trials of political activists are totally unlawful. There is no possibility of justice through these proceedings.

Detainees are being denied food and water during hearings and are forced to stand for long periods of time. When they try to protest by turning their backs to the court, they are grabbed by the neck and forced to face the court. These proceedings amount to further mental torture for activists.”