Pro-democracy activists sentenced in Burma

Fourteen pro-democracy activists who tried to rally people against the Burmese military regime have each been sentenced to 65 years in jail, prompting strong protests from human rights campaigners. Five of the defendants were women.

The campaigners were all members of the 88 Generation Students Group, a prominent pro-democracy organisation whose members were involved in a 1988 uprising against the junta that was crushed with the deaths of at least 3,000 people. Jailed and released after lengthy sentences, the activists last year returned again to rally the Burmese people after the regime raised the prices of fuel and transport, leaving millions of ordinary citizens despairing.

Relatives of those jailed by a court operating inside Rangoon's Insein jail, one of the world's most notorious prisons, said the sentences had been handed down yesterday morning. "I heard from sources close to the prison that my son and thirteen others were given 65-year prison sentences this morning in a closed-door trial," Nyunt Nyunt Oo, mother of 31-year-old Pandeik Tun, one of the 14, told the Associated Press. "No family members or defence lawyers were present at the trial."

The sentences are just the latest in a series of moves taken by the regime to further crack down on dissent in Burma. On Monday, a court also operating in the jail sentenced 28-year-old blogger Nay Phone Latt to 20 years imprisonment after he published a cartoon of senior general Than Shwe. The court also jailed for two years a dissident poet, Saw Wai, who printed a series of verses, the first line of each spelled out the message "Than Shwe is foolish with power". The poem had been printed in the weekly poetry magazine Love Journal. Three defence lawyers have also been jailed after complaining of unfair treatment meted out to their clients.

Meanwhile, nine other senior members of the 88 Generation Students who are facing various similar charges as those activists who were jailed were recently given six months sentences for interrupting judicial proceedings during their closed trial.

Campaigners say the crackdown against dissent defies demands by the UN in the aftermath of the massive democracy uprising last year that the regime release political prisoners, including opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Instead, they say, up to 2,100 such prisoners are now behind bars - double the number than before September's demonstrations that involved thousands of the country's Buddhist monks.

"The UN Security Council said the regime must release political prisoners," said Nang Seng of the Burma Campaign UK. "Instead the regime has arrested a thousand more people, and is now jailing them for life. The regime is defying the Security Council. The council must respond."

Many of those sentenced played prominent roles in demonstrations that preceded last September's mass demonstrations. Several weeks before tens of thousands of people and saffron-robed monks poured onto the streets of Burma's largest cities, the activists had organised much smaller rallies in Rangoon that were quickly broken up by the authorities.

Among the activists were Kyaw Min Yu, also known as Jimmy, and his wife Nilar Thein. Nilar Thein, who was forced to abandon her newborn daughter and go in to hiding, only to be arrested two months ago, was also among those jailed.

Nyunt Nyunt Oo said his son and others were sentenced under various charges including the so-called 5/96 law that declares that anyone who demonstrates, makes speeches or writes statements undermining stability can be jailed for up to 20 years. She said the other charges involved the Video Act, the Foreign Exchange act, the Electronics Act and links with illegal groups.

Asked if she is going to appeal, she said: "I don't think any effort will make a difference because the judgment is one-sided and this was what the authorities had decided to do."