• • • • • • • Disrespects existing laws or the Constitution. Defames or tarnishes the image of the nation. Brings about the disintegration of or defames the Tatmadaw. Causes racial or religious conflict or harms dignity and morality. Exploits religion for political ends. Incites obstruction of peaceful educational activities/ Incites civil service personnel to fail to perform their duty or to oppose the government.17 The first problem here is that many of these restrictions are very broadly defined. For example, strong criticism of the performance of the government could be deemed to “tarnish the image of the nation”. In some cases, the restrictions focus on speech that could be seen as critical of the government or Tatmadaw. This is not in accordance with international human rights standards, which offer heightened protection for criticism of government figures and bodies, including during election campaigning. Second, the ability of the UEC to screen manuscripts combined with these broad restrictions on speech grant too much power and discretion to the UEC, creating a right of politicised decision-making. National Records and Archives Law Myanmar passed a new National Records and Archives Law in December 2019 which came into effect in January 2020. CLD published a Note on the draft law in August 2019 which highlighted the draft law’s tendency to heighten a culture of secrecy rather than to promote a culture of a right to information.18 Specific concerns outlined in our Note included: • The system of classifying information sets very lengthy periods for the classification of information, with three of the four classification categories lasting for 20-30 years and the fourth lasting for five years. • The classification system appears to assume that all information will be subject to at least some period of classification, with no open classification being listed. • Officials have significant discretion in determining the level of classification. • The Law fails to establish a right to access even documents which are not classified. • The Law lacks a strong public interest override. This would require documents to be disclosed if the public interest in accessing them outweighed the interest in keeping those document secret. The final version, now in effect, is very similar to the draft analysed by CLD. There are a few alterations, according to secondary reports. Positively, a weak presumption in favour of public access to documents after the period of classification is over was added, although public authorities can still refuse to disclose documents. Less positively, fines under the Law were increased and it creates offences such as viewing or copying a secret document without 17 Ibid., para. 7. Available at https://www.law-democracy.org/live/myanmar-archives-law-fails-to-respect-the-right-to-information. An English version of the draft law is available at: https://www.law-democracy.org/live/wpcontent/uploads/2019/08/Myanmar.ArchivesLaw.Jul19.pdf. 18 -6-