Suu Kyi, who was ousted by an army takeover in February last year, had denied the allegation that she had accepted gold and hundreds of thousands of dollars given her as a bribe by a top political colleague
A court in military-ruled Myanmar convicted the country’s former leader Aung San Suu Kyi, 76, of corruption and sentenced her to five years in prison on Wednesday, April 27, in the first of several corruption cases against her, a report in The Tribune, Chandigarh, says.
Suu Kyi, who was ousted by an army take-over last year, had denied the allegation that she had accepted gold and hundreds of thousands of dollars given her as a bribe by a top political colleague.
Her supporters and independent legal experts consider her prosecution an unjust move to discredit Suu Kyi and legitimise the military’s seizure of power.
In the case decided on Wednesday, April 27, she was accused of receiving $600,000 and seven gold bars in 2017-18 from Phyo Min Thein, the former chief minister of Yangon, the country’s biggest city.
She has already been sentenced to six years’ imprisonment in other cases and faces 10 more corruption charges. The maximum punishment under the Anti-Corruption Act is 15 years in prison and a fine. Convictions in the other cases could bring sentences of more than 100 years in prison in total for a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who already spent years in detention for defying military rule.
Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party won a landslide victory in the 2020 general election, but lawmakers were not allowed to take their seats when the army seized power on February 1, 2021, arresting Suu Kyi and many senior colleagues in her party and government.
Following the take-over, large non-violent nationwide protests, were quashed by security forces quashed with lethal force that has so far led to the deaths of almost 1,800 civilians.
As repression escalated, armed resistance against the military government grew, and some UN experts now characterize the country as being in a state of civil war.
Suu Kyi has not been seen or allowed to speak in public since she was detained and is being held in an undisclosed location. However, at last week’s final hearing in the case, she appeared to be in good health and asked her supporters to “stay united,”
In the case decided on Wednesday, April 27, she was accused of receiving $600,000 and seven gold bars in 2017-18 from Phyo Min Thein, the former chief minister of Yangon, the country’s biggest city.
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