Since the start of 2014, Amnesty International is aware of at least three cases where criminal defamation charges have been brought against individuals who have simply exercised their right to freedom of expression:  Two media workers from the Myanmar Post Weekly, sentenced to two months’ imprisonment on 18 March 2015 for criminal defamation after publishing an interview with a member of the Myanmar Army who was also a Member of Parliament for Mon State. The MP had filed a complaint against Editor-in-chief Than Htike Thu and Deputy-chief reporter San Moe Tun, claiming they had misrepresented him in the headline they chose for the article in January 2014. Both men were released in May 2015.  Five media workers from the Daily Eleven newspaper, charged with criminal defamation after the paper published an article about misuse of funds by the Ministry of Information. At the time of writing, the court case was still ongoing.127  Activist Chaw Sandi Tun, charged in October 2015 with defamation under the Penal Code and the 2013 Telecommunications Law after posting an image on social media with the comment that opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi was wearing clothes of a colour similar to those of the army, in particular Commander-inChief Senior General Min Aung Hlaing. The Penal Code charge was dropped by the Maubin Township Court on 15 December but she was sentenced to six months in prison under the 2013 Telecommunications Law two weeks later. She is currently imprisoned in Maubin prison, Ayeyarwady Region. The UN Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of opinion and expression has emphasized that the only purpose of laws covering defamation, libel, slander and insult must be to protect reputations and not to prevent criticism of the government. He has stated further that defamation laws should reflect the importance of open debate about matters of public interest. He has also highlighted the principle that public figures are required to tolerate a greater degree of criticism than private citizens. The UN Human Rights Committee has also underscored these points,128 and stated that defamation laws “must be crafted with care to ensure that they comply with [the right to freedom of expression] and that they do not serve, in practice, to stifle freedom of expression.”129 Amnesty International is particularly concerned about the use of criminal defamation provisions against journalists and other media workers. Such charges can seriously impede the ability to seek and receive information, a key component of the right to freedom of expression, which may create an environment in which journalists and other media workers apply self-censorship to avoid the threat of arrest and imprisonment.130 DEFAMATION UNDER THE 2013 TELECOMMUNICATIONS LAW In 2013 Myanmar enacted the Telecommunications Law as part of a programme aimed at liberalizing the country’s telecommunications sector. At the time human rights organizations raised concerns about various provisions in the draft law which did not sufficiently protect the right to freedom of expression and could potentially be used to silence online activists and bloggers.131 See Chapter 3, Targeting movements p24 Human Rights Committee, General comment No. 34, Article 19: Freedoms of opinion and expression, UN Doc. CCPR/C/GC/34, 12 September 2011, para. 38. 129 Human Rights Committee, General comment No. 34, Article 19: Freedoms of opinion and expression, UN Doc. CCPR/C/GC/34, 12 September 2011, para. 47. 130 Amnesty International, Caught between state censorship and self-censorship: prosecution and intimidation of media workers in Myanmar (Index: ASA 16/1743/2015), 17 June 2015. 131 See for example Human Rights Watch, Reforming Telecommunications in Burma: Human Rights and Responsible Investment in Mobile and the Internet, May 2013, pp11-13. 127 128 NEW EXPRESSION MEETS OLD REPRESSION ENDING THE CYCLE OF POLITICAL ARRESTS AND IMPRISONMENT IN MYANMAR Amnesty International 40