AFP, Yangon :
Myanmar announced the release of thousands of prisoners including scores of Chinese loggers on Thursday in a mass amnesty aimed at promoting “goodwill”, officials said, after a series of spats between Yangon and Beijing.
Authorities acting on the instructions of President Thein Sein ordered some 6,966 detainees — 210 of them foreigners — to be freed across the country after they had been “well disciplined”, according to a statement on the Ministry of Information website.
The amnesties, which the information ministry says the president issued “on humanitarian grounds”, come ahead of general elections in November.
It is not clear if Burmese political prisoners were among those freed.
President Thein Sein, who won power in 2010 in elections which saw military rule replaced with a military-backed civilian government, has pledged to release all political prisoners.
Most political prisoners in Myanmar have already been released as part of the reform process.
However, there are thought to be more than 150 political prisoners still being held, the Irrawaddy news site reported, citing the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.
Those freed on Thursday included eight former military intelligence officers who were jailed in 2004, the agency reported.
The polls have triggered criticism that the government is backsliding on political reforms it promised upon taking power in 2011, after almost five decades of repressive military rule. Past governments have released political prisoners as a way of easing criticism from abroad.
The move hoped to promote “goodwill and is aimed at keeping a friendly relationship between countries”, it said.
The release included all of the 155 Chinese nationals handed long jail sentences for illegal logging in northern Myanmar near their shared border earlier this month, according to a home affairs ministry official who asked to remain anonymous because he was unauthorised to speak to the press.
“More than 150 Chinese will be released in the amnesty,” he said without giving further details.
A second official from the corrections department also confirmed that Chinese nationals would be released.
The decision to jail the loggers sparked outraged editorials in Chinese state media, as well as a plea by Beijing to be “reasonable”.
It was not immediately clear if political prisoners were among those freed in the release, the latest in a series of amnesties under the reformist government that have seen sentences quashed for hundreds of dissidents.
Thein Sein’s regime, which took power in 2011, has been rewarded for a string of reforms — including prisoner amnesties and welcoming Aung San Suu Kyi’s opposition party into parliament — with most Western sanctions removed.
But his government has faced growing claims of backtracking as scores of activists and protesters have been arrested in recent months amid signs that media freedoms are being tightened after the official lifting of censorship.
The Myanmar leader has also been accused of timing amnesties for political benefit, while local people fret that thousands of criminals are released alongside dissidents.
Myanmar announced the release of thousands of prisoners including scores of Chinese loggers on Thursday in a mass amnesty aimed at promoting “goodwill”, officials said, after a series of spats between Yangon and Beijing.
Authorities acting on the instructions of President Thein Sein ordered some 6,966 detainees — 210 of them foreigners — to be freed across the country after they had been “well disciplined”, according to a statement on the Ministry of Information website.
The amnesties, which the information ministry says the president issued “on humanitarian grounds”, come ahead of general elections in November.
It is not clear if Burmese political prisoners were among those freed.
President Thein Sein, who won power in 2010 in elections which saw military rule replaced with a military-backed civilian government, has pledged to release all political prisoners.
Most political prisoners in Myanmar have already been released as part of the reform process.
However, there are thought to be more than 150 political prisoners still being held, the Irrawaddy news site reported, citing the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners.
Those freed on Thursday included eight former military intelligence officers who were jailed in 2004, the agency reported.
The polls have triggered criticism that the government is backsliding on political reforms it promised upon taking power in 2011, after almost five decades of repressive military rule. Past governments have released political prisoners as a way of easing criticism from abroad.
The move hoped to promote “goodwill and is aimed at keeping a friendly relationship between countries”, it said.
The release included all of the 155 Chinese nationals handed long jail sentences for illegal logging in northern Myanmar near their shared border earlier this month, according to a home affairs ministry official who asked to remain anonymous because he was unauthorised to speak to the press.
“More than 150 Chinese will be released in the amnesty,” he said without giving further details.
A second official from the corrections department also confirmed that Chinese nationals would be released.
The decision to jail the loggers sparked outraged editorials in Chinese state media, as well as a plea by Beijing to be “reasonable”.
It was not immediately clear if political prisoners were among those freed in the release, the latest in a series of amnesties under the reformist government that have seen sentences quashed for hundreds of dissidents.
Thein Sein’s regime, which took power in 2011, has been rewarded for a string of reforms — including prisoner amnesties and welcoming Aung San Suu Kyi’s opposition party into parliament — with most Western sanctions removed.
But his government has faced growing claims of backtracking as scores of activists and protesters have been arrested in recent months amid signs that media freedoms are being tightened after the official lifting of censorship.
The Myanmar leader has also been accused of timing amnesties for political benefit, while local people fret that thousands of criminals are released alongside dissidents.
