Dissident blogger given 20 years

A young Burmese blogger who fed the outside world news from a locked-down country on the September 2007 uprising was sentenced to 20 years and six months imprisonment today.

Nay Phone Latt, 28, is one of more than a dozen dissidents now being brought before military judges in a closed court in Rangoon’s infamous Insein Prison. Several of their lawyers are joining them in the dock, after complaining of unfair treatment by the court.

Three of the lawyers were charged with contempt of court last week and jailed for up to six months. Four others have been barred from representing their clients, who are now being tried without any legal representation.

Nay Phone Latt was convicted of contravening Public Offense Act 505 B by posting a cartoon depicting junta leader Snr-Gen Than Shwe on his blog site.

A friend, Saw Wai, was sentenced to two years imprisonment for publishing a poem mocking Than Shwe in the weekly Love Journal, according to Rangoon sources. The first words of each line of the Burmese language poem spelled out the message “Senior General Than Shwe is foolish with power.”

Two outspoken Rangoon journalists, Htun Htun Thein and Khin Maung Aye, of the privately-owned weekly News Watch, have also been arrested in the current crackdown and are being held in Insein Prison on unknown charges.

FIRST POSTED NOVEMBER 10, 2008