Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi Moved From Prison to House Arrest

Myanmar's Ministry of Information said on Thursday the president "has decided to commute the remaining sentences of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who is currently serving her sentence at Nay Pyi Taw Prison, to be served under house arrest".

Aung San Suu Kyi was the state counsellor and de facto leader of the democratically elected civilian government that was overthrown by the military in a 2021 coup.

Aung Hlaing, the senior general who led the coup and served as junta head, was elected by parliament as president on April 3.

The parliament was elected in polls held between December last year and January this year without the participation of Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD), which had been banned in 2021 after the coup.

After his election, amid a move to gain wide international acceptance for a regime facing isolation, Aung Hlaing promised amnesties to promote social reconciliation.

Myanmar needs international acceptance because its economy is battered and shaken by a devastating earthquake last year, as it faced several ethnic insurgencies.

Win Myint, who was the president in the ousted civilian government, was released from detention on April 17 along with over 4,300 political prisoners in a gesture the junta said was in observance of Myanmar's New Year that day.

The National Unity Government in exile, representing the overthrown civilian rulers, said it "expresses its sincere satisfaction" with the release of "certain political prisoners -- including our President, U Win Myint -- who were unjustly arrested and detained by the military dictatorship".

The Ministry said that the decision to move the 80-year-old Aung San Suu Kyi, who is in frail health, to house detention was taken "from a perspective of the state's benevolence and goodwill".

It also said it was in observance of the Full Moon Day of Kasone, "as well as in recognition of her humanitarian compassion".

That is a sacred day for Myanmar Buddhists, commemorating in one festival the birth, enlightenment, and passing into nirvana of Buddha.

Under the junta rule, Aung San Suu Kyi was charged with offences as petty as owning walkie-talkies to as serious as sedition and corruption and sentenced to a total of 33 years.

It had been reduced successively to 22 years and six months, and on Thursday, the junta said it was reducing it by a sixth, while she would continue in house detention.

A graduate of Lady Shri Ram College in Delhi, Aung San Suu Kyi is the daughter of Aung San, the country's Independence movement leader, who was assassinated before freedom from British rule in 1948.

The country first came under military rule in a 1962 coup and has mostly been under the yoke of dictatorships, with short interregnums of democracy.

Aung San Suu Kyi returned to Myanmar and became a leader of the NLD in 1988.

She has been in and out of prison and house detention over the decades.

She is married to a British citizen, and the junta used that to bar her from becoming president.

The NLD made her the state counsellor, a title that gave her access to government and made her the de facto leader.

- IANS