Politicians, doctors and a fortune-teller: Myanmar’s new wave of detainees

Since Myanmar’s military seized power in a coup on Feb. 1, overthrowing elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi, security forces have detained more than 1,200 people, hundreds at protests and many more in raids - often at night.

As well as Suu Kyi and her cabinet, the detainees include doctors and teachers, actors and singers, and other civilians who took part in daily protests, according to figures from The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP).

Myanmar’s junta did not respond to requests for comment on the detentions, but has threatened action against those accused of destabilising the country. The army seized power after its allegations of fraud in Nov. 8 elections were rejected.

Some detainees survived prison under former juntas. Some were dragged from their homes, hundreds were seized by riot police and soldiers who charged down protests against the coup. Many are held incommunicado.

The AAPP was founded by ex-prisoners of the former junta who now find themselves recording a new generation of political detainees. They had identified at least 1,206 by March 2. These are some of their stories.

When security forces arrived at Aung San Suu Kyi’s villa in the capital, Naypyitaw, at 3.00am on Feb. 1, she was prepared. Three days earlier, during heated talks with the military, she’d had her mobile phone destroyed in anticipation of her arrest, sources close to her told Reuters. She asked an intermediary to tell her son Kim, who lives in Britain, what was happening, one source said. The 75-year-old also wrote a letter urging people to resist the coup. She has not appeared publicly since being detained in the home where she lives with her dog Taichito, a gift from her son.

Under the previous junta, she had spent a total 15 years under house arrest. She now faces four sets of charges over accusations of illegally importing walkie-talkie radios, having unlicensed communications equipment, breaching coronavirus protocols and causing alarm. The charges are trumped up, her defenders say. Her lawyers said she appeared well in a trial hearing by video link on March 1.

A longtime aide to Suu Kyi and senior member of her National League for Democracy (NLD), 80-year-old Win Htein had also packed his bags in anticipation of arrest. The one-time military captain spent years in jail under the former junta. On the morning of the coup, he told reporters the army chief had given “priority to power and his personal desire” over Myanmar’s interests. “I feel pity for him,” he said.

The night of Feb. 4, security forces took him from his home in Yangon to Naypyitaw, where he is in a detention center. From the car, he spoke to journalists and his youngest daughter, Chit Suu Win Htein. “He asked me, ‘Are you crying now? Don’t cry,’” she said.

The family have since heard little of his condition and are worried about his health – he has problems with his knee and heart and has great difficulty walking. On Feb. 19, he appeared in court by video link to face sedition charges - which carry a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.

“My dad asked whether he is allowed to have a lawyer and the judge said, ‘Yes but you haven’t authorised power to hire a lawyer’, then my dad said abruptly, ‘Then why don’t you guys just jail me quick?’,” she said. Reuters was unable to reach police for comment.

As nine armed air force troops hustled 63-year-old Ko Ko Htwe, clad in a longyi and flip-flops, down a dirt path leading away from his home in eastern Shan state on Feb. 11, his daughter asked them what crime he had committed. In footage posted on Facebook, she can be heard pleading with them, saying, “My father is not a criminal, not a robber. Why are you taking him with guns?” The men do not answer.

“He ran as much as he could, but they caught him,” his daughter, Myat Hsu Thwin, told Reuters by phone.

Video footage shows his wife asking the troops: “Don’t you feel shame?”. His daughter cries: “If even a little thing happens to my father, we will crush you into pieces!” They do not know where he is being held or what charges he faces.

“He never did anything dishonest or unlawful,” Myat Hsu Thwin said.

Reuters was unable to reach police for comment.

Doctor Pyae Phyo Naing was stitching up a patient’s head wound when the police came. At first, his wife Phyu Lei Thu, also a doctor, thought one of the officers was there for treatment. He was a regular patient at their clinic in the low-lying Irrawaddy delta region, she said. But then he asked Pyae Phyo Naing to come with him for a discussion.

The lead doctor at a government hospital, he had joined the civil disobedience movement encouraging government employees to strike in protest at the new junta and shut the hospital on Feb. 8. He was only treating emergency cases.

“We are against dictatorship, but we don’t want to hurt our patients,” Phyu Lei Thu said. Pyae Phyo Naing asked the police to wait until he had finished the stitches, but they refused. He was dragged backwards out of the clinic, a CCTV video shows.

Since then, all the doctors in the town have fled and none of the hospitals are open. Phyu Lei Thu has told their youngest daughter her father is in the meditation centre.

“We must be patient and keep fighting against the dictatorship,” she said. “We need to keep growing our strength to fight back, and believe we will win.”

Lieutenant General Tun Shwe of Irrawaddy Division Police told Reuters Pyae Phyo Naing was “detained in a safe place” and action would be taken according to the law.

The 42-year-old headmistress of a high school in southeastern Karen state, Dr Cho Yu Mon was reassured she was not under arrest when the police came to her home in Hpa’An town on Feb. 5. They said they only wanted to ask some questions about the civil disobedience movement. Dr Cho Yu Mon had closed her school and taken to the streets to participate.

Recorded in mobile phone footage, she asks the police if she has time to put on makeup before she is taken to what she is told will be a meeting. “You are beautiful already,” a policewoman says.

“This is nonsense,” Dr Cho Yu Mon says. “I don’t accept this – you think you can do whatever you want to a citizen.”

Instead of taking her to a meeting, the officers drove her to a police station and then to a local court where a judge was waiting. She was charged with causing “public alarm”, for protesting against the military coup, according to her brother, Kyaw Lin Htut.

“They cheated us to bring her,” he told Reuters. “They didn’t have a warrant. I think if they could not bring her in the soft way, they would have done it violently,” he said.

No family members were allowed inside the court nor was a lawyer, he said. On Feb. 17, they were told the trial had begun by video-conference.

“We just express our desire peacefully as human rights, I believe that we have every right to express what we want,” Kyaw Lin Htut said.

Reuters was unable to reach police for comment.

A writer and philanthropist, 69-year-old Than Myint Aung was taken from her home by armed men in the early hours of the night of the coup. CCTV captured the raid.

Three white cars can be seen pulling up outside the house in the darkness. A stray dog watches several armed soldiers walk towards the gate of the house. A day before, Than Myint Aung had been one of the first people in Myanmar to get the COVID-19 vaccine. Her grandson, unable to sleep, goes downstairs and peers at the soldiers.

The men tell him they have an appointment with his grandmother. He goes upstairs to fetch her and, seconds later, two soldiers climb over the fence. Several others walk in. One throws a covering over the camera. Then, according to the writer’s granddaughter, Khaing Wittyee Htet, they broke the door locks and cut the camera cables.

Khaing Wittyee Htet said it wasn’t clear why her grandmother was arrested. As well as writing short stories and novels - mostly about the struggles of the poor – and charitable work, Than Myint Aung moved in political circles. She had met Aung San Suu Kyi.

“She always told us to become a good citizen, she always worked and helped to make things better in society,” her granddaughter, said.

The family doesn’t know where she is being held or what she is being charged with. Only that, two days after her arrest, more soldiers came to the house to collect things she asked for. The list – written in her handwriting – included a new office suit.

“It is significant, I don’t know why,” Khaing Wittyee Htet said.

Reuters was unable to reach police for comment.

One of two foreigners detained since the coup, Australian academic Sean Turnell was an adviser to Aung San Suu Kyi on economic reforms and the most prominent foreign expert on Myanmar’s financial system. Police detained him on the morning of Feb. 6 at Yangon’s Chatrium Hotel in Yangon as he was meeting Australian ambassador Andrea Faulkner.

“I got a text from him at 8:42, I was ready to meet him at 9 o’clock for coffee, he told me not to come, he was being detained,” said a source close to him, who asked not to be named.

After a tense standoff that lasted hours, police drove him away in a white car, the source said. Turnell sent a message to Reuters saying he had been detained but was “fine and strong, and not guilty of anything”, adding a smile emoji. The Australian government says the ambassador has since spoken to him over a Zoom call. The source said he said he was fine but bored at Yangon’s Insein prison. The army has not announced any charges. Reuters was unable to reach police for comment.

Ha Vu, his wife, said in a statement he was “an economist at heart who dedicated his knowledge, expertise, and hard work to help bring investment and job opportunities to Myanmar, to help Myanmar integrate with other economies in the region and the world, to help Myanmar grow faster and stronger.”

Hein Min Aung, a 25-year-old astrologer from a suburb of Yangon, had been involved in a ritual of lighting candles on nine knives in prayer for the fall of the new dictatorship. His boyfriend, Thit Thura Zen, said the main aim was to protect protesters.

Many people in Myanmar consult soothsayers, especially in times of crisis. Former dictators Ne Win and Than Shwe were said to have based key decisions on the advice of astrologers and numerologists. Hein Min Aung ran his business mostly online.

“He wanted people who went out to the street protesting to be safe,” Thit Thura Zen said, of the ritual. “He was helping people.”

An orphan from Pathein, in the Irrawaddy delta region, Hein Min Aung came to Yangon as a teenager and studied engineering before dropping out.

“During these days many people came to him and asked him to make predictions and protective objects,” Thit Thura Zen said. “People want to hear energising words from him… He is a good man. He’s always generous and helps other people.”

Since his arrest, there has been no news about where he is being detained. He has a weak heart, Thit Thura Zen said. Reuters was unable to reach police for comment.