Aung San Suu Kyi's jail term reduced

Yangon, Aug 1

Myanmar's State Administration Council on Tuesday reduced the sentences of ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi Aung San Suu Kyi and former president U Win Myint, while also granting pardons to over 7,000 prisoners.

According to the Council, six years of sentences for Suu Kyi and four years for U Win Myint were reduced, Xinhua news agency.

The Nobel Laureate and the former President were arrested shortly after the military coup on February 1, 2021.

The pardon, part of a seasonal amnesty, will reduce Suu Kyi's 33-year jail sentence by six years.

Periodic amnesties have been announced before, but this is the first time they have included the ousted leader and Myint.

Meanwhile, the council also remitted sentences for 7,749 domestic prisoners and 125 foreign inmates, while commuting death sentences for some to life imprisonment, according to the orders.

In addition, the council remitted the sentences for 22 members of the ethnic armed groups and also dismissed the cases related to 72 individuals who were in connection with ethnic armed groups, it said.

Suu Kyi, who was under house arrest following the coup, was moved to solitary confinement last year in a prison in the capital Nay Pyi Taw.

Almost no news of her has emerged in the last two years and she was also rumoured to have been ill, but the the military denied the reports, the BBC reported.

Since the coup, Myanmar has spiralled into a civil war, which has so far killed tens of thousands of people.

The military junta on Monday postponed an election promised to be held by August this year.