A Myanmar court yesterday postponed its verdict in the internationally condemned trial of Aung San Suu Kyi until Aug. 11, adding to uncertainty over the ruling junta's plans for the democracy icon.
Lawyers for the Nobel laureate said the judges announced they needed time to review the case, in which Suu Kyi faces up to five years in jail on charges of violating her house arrest after an American swam to her lakeside home.
“I believe they really have serious legal problems,” her lawyer Nyan Win told reporters after the brief court hearing at Yangon's notorious Insein prison.
PHOTO: AP
“I do not want to say anything regarding politics. But could it be because of pressure from the UN or others? We do not know exactly but there might be something,” he said.
“She should not have been charged in the beginning,” he said.
The 64-year-old Suu Kyi had thanked diplomats for attending the hearing and told them that the outcome of the case “mainly depends on the rule of law,” said Nyan Win, who is also the spokesman for her National League for Democracy (NLD).
Critics have accused Myanmar's iron-fisted generals of using the intrusion by US national John Yettaw as an excuse to keep the opposition leader locked up during elections due next year.
But the regime has appeared increasingly rattled by international outrage over the case, and despite widespread fears of a guilty verdict diplomats have speculated that the court may opt for a lesser sentence of house arrest.
Suu Kyi's international legal counsel, Jared Genser, said the latest postponement in the two-and-a-half-month trial was another attempt by the military government to deflect foreign criticism.
“It is in some ways a smart move — push off the verdict until the middle of August when numerous government and United Nations officials around the world will be on vacation,” Genser said in a statement.
“But it remains to be seen whether this ploy will work or if anticipation will be heightened in the run-up to the issuance of the verdict,” he said.
Riot police surrounded the prison yesterday and police trucks patroled the city following warnings in the junta-controlled state media that protests against a guilty verdict would not be tolerated.
Around two dozen NLD members were arrested around the country on Thursday and yesterday, an exile-based NLD group saud. There was no immediate confirmation from authorities or from Nyan Win.
LONG FLIGHT: The jets would be flown by US pilots, with Taiwanese copilots in the two-seat F-16D variant to help familiarize them with the aircraft, the source said The US is expected to fly 10 Lockheed Martin F-16C/D Block 70/72 jets to Taiwan over the coming months to fulfill a long-awaited order of 66 aircraft, a defense official said yesterday. Word that the first batch of the jets would be delivered soon was welcome news to Taiwan, which has become concerned about delays in the delivery of US arms amid rising military tensions with China. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official said the initial tranche of the nation’s F-16s are rolling off assembly lines in the US and would be flown under their own power to Taiwan by way
CHIP WAR: The new restrictions are expected to cut off China’s access to Taiwan’s technologies, materials and equipment essential to building AI semiconductors Taiwan has blacklisted Huawei Technologies Co (華為) and Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯), dealing another major blow to the two companies spearheading China’s efforts to develop cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) chip technologies. The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ International Trade Administration has included Huawei, SMIC and several of their subsidiaries in an update of its so-called strategic high-tech commodities entity list, the latest version on its Web site showed on Saturday. It did not publicly announce the change. Other entities on the list include organizations such as the Taliban and al-Qaeda, as well as companies in China, Iran and elsewhere. Local companies need
CRITICISM: It is generally accepted that the Straits Forum is a CCP ‘united front’ platform, and anyone attending should maintain Taiwan’s dignity, the council said The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) yesterday said it deeply regrets that former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) echoed the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) “one China” principle and “united front” tactics by telling the Straits Forum that Taiwanese yearn for both sides of the Taiwan Strait to move toward “peace” and “integration.” The 17th annual Straits Forum yesterday opened in Xiamen, China, and while the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) local government heads were absent for the first time in 17 years, Ma attended the forum as “former KMT chairperson” and met with Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference Chairman Wang Huning (王滬寧). Wang
CROSS-STRAIT: The MAC said it barred the Chinese officials from attending an event, because they failed to provide guarantees that Taiwan would be treated with respect The Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) on Friday night defended its decision to bar Chinese officials and tourism representatives from attending a tourism event in Taipei next month, citing the unsafe conditions for Taiwanese in China. The Taipei International Summer Travel Expo, organized by the Taiwan Tourism Exchange Association, is to run from July 18 to 21. China’s Taiwan Affairs Office spokeswoman Zhu Fenglian (朱鳳蓮) on Friday said that representatives from China’s travel industry were excluded from the expo. The Democratic Progressive Party government is obstructing cross-strait tourism exchange in a vain attempt to ignore the mainstream support for peaceful development
RSS