Myanmar Releases Rights Activist Early

Myanmar rights activist Su Su Nway, who was sentenced to 18 months in prison after she challenged the government practice of forcing citizens to work, was unexpectedly released Tuesday, nine months early.

Her release was hailed by human rights activists who had praised her willingness to speak out in a country where dissent is severely punished. Myanmar has more than 1,100 political prisoners.

Su Su Nway, 34, who suffers from a heart condition, visited the headquarters of the opposition National League for Democracy and said she would continue fighting for human rights in the nation, which is also known as Burma, no matter what the cost.

“I took [my] prison uniform with me because I know that I will have to come back to prison until Burma gains democracy,” she told the Norway-based opposition Democratic Voice of Burma radio service.

Myanmar, which has been run by the military for more than four decades, has ruthlessly suppressed the country’s nonviolent democracy movement. Thousands of pro-democracy demonstrators were gunned down in 1988. The military refused to hand over power in 1990 after losing the country’s only democratic election.

Among those stifled is opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize laureate who has been in detention for more than 10 of the last 17 years. The regime recently extended Suu Kyi’s house arrest, despite an appeal from U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan. There was no immediate explanation for the decision to release Su Su Nway.

Her case had achieved international notoriety because she was the first Myanmar citizen to take government officials to court for making people work without compensation, a practice that is technically illegal but widespread.

Two officials from her village near Yangon, the former capital, were convicted last year and sentenced to eight months in prison for making Su Su Nway and her neighbors work without pay on a road project.

Afterward, the slight and ailing activist was charged with intimidating a new village official and in October was sentenced to 18 months in prison. Her supporters said that the idea of her intimidating anyone was ludicrous and that the charge was simply revenge for her court victory.

The Times reported on her case in a May 21 article from Myanmar, noting her unusual willingness to speak out in a country that has successfully silenced most opposition leaders.

“I will continue to stand for the truth and fight for the elimination of forced labor in the country,” Su Su Nway told the Associated Press on Tuesday in Yangon. She added her thanks to supporters and the international media “who had helped make my release possible.”

The International Labor Organization, a U.N. agency that has fought the practice of forced labor, had urged the Myanmar government to free her and reiterated that call Saturday at a meeting in Geneva.

“The ILO welcomes today’s release of Su Su Nway,” said Richard Horsey, the ILO representative in Myanmar. “The ILO has always maintained that she should be released.”

The U.S. State Department also had called for her release, saying her imprisonment underlined the brutality of the Myanmar government. Supporters had worried that Su Su Nway was not receiving adequate care for her heart ailment.

“I am fine, but I don’t feel happy or sad about my release because forced labor in Burma still exists,” she told the Democratic Voice of Burma, which also had highlighted her case. “I will continue fighting against forced labor and all kinds of human rights abuses.”