The Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP) has strongly condemned the junta’s recent wave of extrajudicial killings of political prisoners and is urging the international community to take collective action to ensure that all those involved in the crimes are held accountable.
The junta has been using prison transfers in recent months as a pretext for interrogating, torturing and killing political prisoners, the AAPP said in a statement on Monday, citing the disappearance of 37 political prisoners on June 27 as one example.
The advocacy group earlier reported that 37 political prisoners from Daik-U (Kyaiksakaw) Prison in Bago Region have been missing since June 27 when the junta removed them from the prison, saying it was transferring them.
Prison officials told relatives of the prisoners they did not know their former inmates’ whereabouts, the AAPP said.
Families of two of the 37 missing political prisoners received letters informing them that the prisoners were dead.
The letters were sent to the families of Ko Khant Linn Naing and Ko Pyae Phyo Hein on July 7 and 8, respectively. In the letters, the junta claimed that the pair had attempted to escape while being transferred with from Daik-U prison to Insein Prison.
They were killed by “warning shots” fired by security personnel trying to recapture them, the letters said.
According to the Myanmar Political Prisoners Network, which was formed after the coup, seven political prisoners—including Ko Khant Linn Naing and Ko Pyae Phyo Hein—have reportedly died after being removed from Kyaiksawkaw Prison.
“These brazen murders of political prisoners in prisons violate not only domestic laws, but also international laws,” the AAPP said, adding that they also violate the ASEAN Human Rights Convention.
On July 2, the family of political prisoner Sein Win was informed that he had died from intestinal bleeding in Myingyan Prison that day. Inmates at the prison, however, said Sein Win had been removed from prison and interrogated before he died, the AAPP said.
Relatives of Sein Win say they found bruises on his body after they recovered it.
“We, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, strongly condemn such unlawful killings and torture, we will do our best to ensure justice for all political prisoners who have been wrongfully imprisoned,” the statement said.
It also urged the international community to collectively take action through international judicial mechanisms to hold those responsible for the crimes accountable.
Since the coup in February 2021, at least 3,757 people have been killed by the junta, with 150 of them dying in prison due to poor healthcare, mistreatment and torture, or during interrogation, the AAPP said.
That number is based on data it collected. The real number could be higher.
