On the 7th of May, two Reuters journalists, Wa Lone, 33 and Kyaw Soe Oo, 29, finally walked free from a Myanmar prison after spending more than 500 days behind bars.
Before being convicted, the journalists were convicted for looking into the killing of 10 Rohingya Muslim men and boys by security forces and Buddhist civilians wearing civilian clothing. The two journalists were arrested in December of 2017 and were sentenced to a prison term of seven years, in September of 2018.
In December 2017, the reporters found these killings were being conducted as a part of the Army crackdown from August 2017, in Rakhine State, a place in western Myanmar. According to estimations by the United Nations (UN,) this army crackdown resulted in more than 730,000 Rohingya citizens fleeing to Bangladesh.
The two journalists were released under a presidential amnesty. It is customary for Myanmar to release its long term prisoners during their New Year, a period of celebration which begins on the 17th of April.
The journalists were driven by their colleagues from Reuters. In the past one month, the Myanmar Government released almost 7000 prisoners under the presidential amnesty.
Stay tuned for more updates.
