Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar’s civilian leader deposed by the military in a coup, was charged on Wednesday with an obscure offense for illegally importing at least 10 walkie-talkies, according to an official from her National League party to Democracy. The violation can be punished with up to three years in prison.
The judicial detention order, issued by officials from the party that ruled Myanmar until Monday’s coup, was dated on the day of the coup and authorizes the detention of Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi for 15 days. The document says that the soldiers who searched his villa in Naypyidaw, the capital, found various communications equipment that were brought into the country without proper documentation.
It was a bizarre postscript for a tense 48 hours in which the army put the country’s most popular leader back under house arrest and extinguished hopes that the Southeast Asian nation could one day serve as a beacon of democracy in a flooded world. by an increasing authoritarianism.
The surprising use of walkie-talkies to justify the arrest of a Nobel Peace Prize winner reinforced the military’s tendency to use a refined strategy to neutralize its biggest political rival. The country’s deposed president was also facing prison terms for alleged violations of coronavirus restrictions.
The coup ousted an elected government that was viewed by voters as the last defense against the military that ruled the country for nearly five decades. During its five-year term, the National League for Democracy received two resounding terms, most recently in last November’s general elections.
As the coup progressed before dawn, the military resorted to the well-known dictatorship playbook: shut down the internet service, suspend flights and stop its critics. Along with Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, her most loyal ministers, Buddhist monks, writers, activists and a filmmaker were also arrested.
Still, in the stunning silence that followed the military’s seizure of power, few soldiers patrolled the streets. On Monday night, Aung San Suu Kyi was back at his villa in Naypyidaw, instead of languishing in one of the country’s notorious prison cells. There were no more mass arrests and the internet was back up and running.
Relative peace – which has so far appeared to be an almost bloodless coup – has prompted some people in Myanmar to cautiously raise their voices against the reimposition of the army government. While some people removed the flags of the National League for Democracy from outside their homes, others participated in small campaigns of civil disobedience, hitting pots and pans or honking their cars to protest the coup.
Dozens of workers on a mobile network gave up in objection to their employers’ military links. Hospital doctors posed together, each with three fingers raised in a defiant greeting from the “Hunger Games” films. The gesture has become a symbol of pro-democracy demonstrations in neighboring Thailand, where rumors of a coup have also emerged.
The charge against Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi, who served a total of 15 years under house arrest before generals released her in 2010, echoed previous charges of esoteric legal crimes. In one case, Mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi had her incarceration extended because an American swam to her lakefront villa without warning, causing her to violate the terms of her confinement.
But if these crimes seem absurd, they have real consequences. The military was in the habit of letting go of its political and critical rivals, overloading them with mysterious offenses.
Along with mrs. Aung San Suu Kyi, President U Win Myint, one of his political acolytes who was also arrested on Monday, received an arrest warrant for violating emergency regulations against the coronavirus. He was accused of hailing a car full of fans during last year’s campaign season, according to U Kyi Toe, the official of the National League for Democracy.
If found guilty, Mr. Win Myint faces up to three years in prison. Keeping a criminal record can prevent you from returning to the presidency.
On Tuesday, the United Nations Security Council, which called a private emergency meeting in Myanmar, refused to issue a statement condemning the coup; China and Russia were opposed to such a move.
In Washington, the State Department said it concluded that the seizure of power by the military was, in fact, a coup d’état, a label that will affect part of US foreign aid to the country.
Myanmar’s military, known as Tatmadaw, delivered its first coup in 1962, a bloody exercise that paved the way for almost five decades of direct government with an iron fist. Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi and the leaders of her National League for Democracy were arrested during what should have been their political heyday.
The generals ordered the massacre of pro-democracy protesters and sent soldiers to expel members of minority ethnic groups from their lands. Even when the junta began to give civilian administration some space to operate, it ensured that the army would still control much of the economic and political sphere.
Confirmation of the accusation against Aung San Suu Kyi, who won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for his peaceful resistance to the army, trickled on Wednesday amid a whirlwind of rumors. In the early afternoon, legislators of the National League for Democracy exchanged pieces of disinformation, even when they themselves were under military detention.
A rumor said that she would be accused of high treason, a crime punishable by death. Another iteration said she was being accused of electoral fraud. No one imagined that their supposed sin would involve walkie-talkies.
In a statement released on Tuesday by the office of the army chief, General Min Aung Hlaing, Tatmadaw said it acted in the best interest of the citizens of Myanmar.
“Over the successive periods, the Myanmar Tatmadaw has kept the motto ‘People are the parents’ in the forefront when it comes to the people,” the statement said, before insisting that the massive electoral fraud in last November’s elections forced to stage a coup.
The National League for Democracy, which oversaw the country’s electoral commission, rejected Tatmadaw’s accusation that voter manipulation had resulted in a weak display by the military’s prosecuting party.
On Wednesday, National League for Democracy lawmakers who were confined to their quarters by soldiers issued a statement saying they still supported Win Myint as president. They rejected suggestions that they had been released from their legislative duties. The national assembly was due to meet for the first time since the November elections on the same day as the coup.
“Stop the intervention actions,” warned the legislators to Tatmadaw. It looked like a two-day late warning.