BANGKOK: Ousted Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi denied the accusations in an election fraud charge against her when she testified for the first time on the case Friday at the prison court in the capital Naypyitaw, a legal official said.
The army seized power from Suu Kyi’s elected government in February last year, claiming massive voting fraud in the 2020 general election, an allegation not corroborated by independent election observers.
Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party won that election in a landslide, while the military-backed Union Solidarity and Development Party did poorly.
A conviction in the election fraud case could lead to Suu Kyi’s party being dissolved and unable to participate in a new election the military has promised will take place in 2023.
Suu Kyi has already been sentenced to 11 years in prison after being convicted on charges of illegally importing and possessing walkie-talkies, violating coronavirus restrictions, sedition and a corruption charge.
Suu Kyi’s supporters and independent analysts say the charges are politically motivated and an attempt to discredit her and legitimize the military’s seizure of power while keeping her from returning to politics.
Suu Kyi is being tried for multiple charges at a new facility constructed in the prison compound in the capital Naypyitaw, including the electoral fraud charge. She was transferred from a secret detention location to a custom-built solitary facility at a prison in Naypyitaw last month.
The penalty for the offense is three years’ imprisonment. Former President Win Myint and former Union Government Office Minister Min Thu are co-defendants in the case.
The election fraud charge was filed in November by the state Election Commission, whose members were appointed by the military government. The military dismissed the commission’s previous members, who had declared there were no major irregularities in the election.
The new commission accused the defendants, including its own former chairman, of being “involved in electoral processes, election fraud and lawless actions.”
A legal official familiar with Friday’s proceedings said Suu Kyi testified in the court that she did not go beyond the country’s constitution in holding the 2020 general election, and did not influence the Union Election Commission in that election, before pleading not guilty. Further details of what she said were not available because of a gag order on her lawyers.
The legal official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to release information, said Suu Kyi appeared to be in good health.
All of Suu Kyi’s trials in the prison court are closed to the media and the public. The prosecutors do not comment on them and the state-controlled media have not reported directly on the proceedings. Suu Kyi’s lawyers have been barred since last year from providing details of the trials under a gag order.
The judge adjourned the election fraud trial for next week, when co-defendant Min Thu will testify.
Win Myint, another co-defendant in the case, gave a courtroom testimony last week denying the accusations against him, the legal official said.
Suu Kyi is also being tried on a charge of violating the Official Secrets Act, which carries a maximum sentence of 14 years, and 11 counts under the Anti-Corruption Law, with each count punishable by up to 15 years in prison and a fine.
The corruption cases are among a large number of charges under which the military is prosecuting her. If found guilty of all the charges, she could be sentenced to more than 100 years in prison.
Her lawyers are trying to overturn the two counts under the Anti-Corruption Act in an appeal to the Supreme Court on technical grounds, saying the case should not have been filed. In this corruption case, she is accused of receiving $550,000 in bribes from Maung Weik, a construction magnate.
The army’s takeover in 2021 was met with widespread non-violent protests. After security forces unleashed lethal force against peaceful demonstrators, some opponents of military rule turned to armed resistance in many areas.
Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi testifies in election fraud trial
https://arab.news/y2n94
Myanmar’s Aung San Suu Kyi testifies in election fraud trial
- A conviction in the election fraud case could lead to Suu Kyi’s party being dissolved
- Suu Kyi has already been sentenced to 11 years in prison
Court to rule on ineligibility for France’s Le Pen in March
Her defense lawyer Rodolphe Bosseult had earlier told judges that prosecutors’ sentencing request was “a weapon of mass destruction of the way things work in a democracy“
PARIS: French far-right figurehead Marine Le Pen will learn in March whether she will be declared ineligible for elections, a Paris court said on Wednesday at the end of a trial for embezzling funds from the European Parliament.
Prosecutors have asked judges at the Paris criminal court that any sentence shutting Le Pen out of public office be applicable even if she appeals the court’s ruling.
That means that if found guilty on March 31, she could be blocked from participating in France’s next presidential election, scheduled for 2027 at the latest.
“This case is a lot less simple than some wanted to think. I still hope we will be heard” by the court, Le Pen, 56, told reporters following the hearing.
Her defense lawyer Rodolphe Bosseult had earlier told judges that prosecutors’ sentencing request was “a weapon of mass destruction of the way things work in a democracy.”
Bosseult added that if imposed, the penalty would affect “the whole electoral roll or even the validity of the vote” in any election.
Prosecutors’ bombshell request was topped off with a five-year jail term, three of which suspended, and a fine of 300,000 euros ($320,000).
At issue in the case are employment practices for assistants in the European Parliament to representatives of Le Pen’s National Front party — since renamed the National Rally (RN) — between 2004 and 2016.
Prosecutors say the party created a “system” using MEPS’ parliamentary allowances to hire people who in fact worked for the outfit in France — not in Brussels or Strasbourg.
The defense struggled throughout the case to produce evidence that any of the supposed assistants had in fact carried out relevant work.
And the European Parliament itself said the RN had cooked the books to the tune of 4.5 million euros.
Prosecutors said that Le Pen could again misuse public funds if allowed to continue in elected office, as justification for their sentencing request.
But her lawyer Bosselut said that the RN’s financial practices at the time were “banal... shared by every European party” in the parliament.
Buoyed this year by the RN’s unprecedented success at snap parliamentary elections, becoming France’s largest single party in parliament, Le Pen has characterised the sentencing request as an attempt to remove her by means of the judiciary rather than a political fair fight.
White House pressing Ukraine to draft 18-year-old men to help fill manpower needs to battle Russia
- The outgoing Democratic administration wants Ukraine to lower the mobilization age to 18 from the current age of 25
- The White House has pushed more than $56 billion in security assistance to Ukraine
WASHINGTON: President Joe Biden’s administration is urging Ukraine to quickly increase the size of its military by drafting more troops and revamping its mobilization laws to allow for the conscription of troops as young as 18.
A senior Biden administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private consultations, said Wednesday that the outgoing Democratic administration wants Ukraine to lower the mobilization age to 18 from the current age of 25 to help expand the pool of fighting age men available to help a badly outmanned Ukraine in its nearly three-year-old war with Russia.
The White House has pushed more than $56 billion in security assistance to Ukraine since the start of Russia’s February 2022 invasion and expects to send billions more to Kyiv before Biden leaves office in less than months.
But with time running out, the Biden White House is also sharpening its viewpoint that Ukraine has the weaponry it needs and now must dramatically increase its manpower if it’s going to stay in the fight with Russia.
The official said the Ukrainians believe they need about 160,000 additional troops, but the US administration believes they probably will need more.
Baltic Sea wind farms impair Sweden’s defense, says military
- The revelation comes after the Swedish government blocked the construction of 13 offshore wind farms in the Baltic on November 4
- “The Swedish Armed Forces have been clear in their evaluation regarding offshore wind energy in the Baltic Sea,” the military said
STOCKHOLM: Offshore wind farms in the Baltic Sea hinder the defense of Sweden and its allies, impairing the military’s ability to identify threats, it said on Wednesday.
The revelation comes after the Swedish government blocked the construction of 13 offshore wind farms in the Baltic on November 4, and stopped another off the island of Gotland on November 21 due to the military’s defense concerns.
On Wednesday the military said all wind farm projects in the Baltic would pose a problem.
“The Swedish Armed Forces have been clear in their evaluation regarding offshore wind energy in the Baltic Sea,” the military said in an email to AFP.
“It would pose unacceptable risks for the defense of our country and our allies,” it added.
The government said the towers and rotating blades of wind turbines emit radar echoes and generate other forms of interference.
The relative proximity of the 13 blocked projects to the “highly militarised” Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, which is sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania, had been “central” in the government’s assessment, Defense Minister Pal Jonson said.
He said wind farms in the area could delay the detection of incoming cruise missiles, cutting the warning time in half to 60 seconds.
“We currently see no technical solutions or legal prerequisites for a coexistence of our defense interests and wind power in the Baltic Sea,” the Armed Forces said on Wednesday.
“The greatly deteriorated security situation after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine means that we can no longer accept any risks to our defense capability.”
“Our ability to detect incoming threats against both Sweden and our allies is vital. Our sensor chain plays a decisive role in this and it must be able to operate with the highest possible capability,” it said.
Tensions have mounted in the Baltic since Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
With Sweden and Finland now NATO members, all of the countries bordering the Baltic are now members of the alliance except Russia.
The Swedish government has insisted that wind power expansion remained a priority, with electricity consumption expected to double by 2045 from the current level.
It has said other areas off Sweden’s southwestern and northeastern coasts were better suited for offshore wind projects.
ICC seeks arrest warrant for Myanmar junta chief over crimes against Rohingya
- ICC prosecutor requests arrest warrant for Gen. Min Aung Hlaing
- Hlaing accused of crimes against humanity, deportation and persecution of the Rohingya
The International Criminal Court’s chief prosecutor on Wednesday applied for an arrest warrant for the head of Myanmar’s military regime for crimes committed against the Rohingya Muslim minority.
Nearly a million people were forced to flee to neighboring Bangladesh from Myanmar’s Rakhine State to escape the 2017 military crackdown that UN experts have referred to as a “genocidal campaign,” amid evidence of ethnic cleansing, mass rape and killings.
ICC judges authorized an investigation into these events in 2019, saying that there was a “reasonable basis to believe widespread and/or systematic acts of violence may have been committed that could qualify as crimes against humanity.”
Although Myanmar is not a state party, Bangladesh ratified the ICC Rome Stature in 2010, which allows the court to have jurisdiction over some crimes related to the Rohingya because of their cross-border nature.
ICC chief prosecutor Karim Khan announced the application for an arrest warrant for Sr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing during a visit to Bangladesh, where he met members of the displaced Rohingya population.
“My office is submitting applications to the judges of the pretrial chamber and this first application is for Min Aung Hlaing, the acting president of Myanmar and the head of the Defense Services of Myanmar. Other warrant applications will follow soon,” he said in a video message.
Hlaing took power from Myanmar’s elected leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, in a coup in 2021. Serving as commander in chief of the Tatmadaw, the armed forces of Myanmar, since 2011, he is accused of having directed attacks against Rohingya civilians.
The ICC chief prosecutor’s office said in a statement that Hlaing “bears criminal responsibility for the crimes against humanity of deportation and persecution of the Rohingya, committed in Myanmar, and in part in Bangladesh” between Aug. 25, 2017 and Dec. 31, 2017 by the armed forces, “supported by the national police, the border guard police, as well as non-Rohingya civilians.”
The arrest warrant application “draws upon a wide variety of evidence from numerous sources such as witness testimonies, including from a number of insider witnesses, documentary evidence and authenticated scientific, photographic and video materials,” Khan’s office said.
Khan’s application is the first against a high-level Myanmar government official since the ICC investigation started seven years ago.
Nur Khan, a Bangladeshi lawyer and human rights activist, told Arab News it was a big development in the course of delivering justice to the Rohingya community and paving the way for the repatriation of Rohingya refugees.
“Eventually, it will create psychological pressure on the Myanmar military junta. It will also pave the way for the world to create a sustainable solution to the Rohingya crisis, ensuring reparation with rights, dignity, and citizenship,” he said.
In 2022, the International Court of Justice, the UN’s top court, started a separate case brought by Gambia, which accused Myanmar of genocide against the Rohingya. Five European countries and Canada have backed the proceedings.
“It’s true that a genocide had been conducted aiming to completely wipe out the Rohingya, and the Myanmar military has committed this crime. The Rohingya have been demanding for many years that those who are responsible for this genocide should be brought to trial,” Nur Khan said.
“We want to remain hopeful that this process will be expedited and that the Rohingya will get back their rights soon.”
Malaysian court drops one of the graft cases against jailed former premier Najib Razak
- Najib had already been convicted in his first graft case tied to the 1Malaysia Development Berhad state fund, or 1MBD, scandal
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia: A Malaysian court on Wednesday dropped charges against jailed former Prime Minister Najib Razak over criminal breach of trust linked to the multibillion-dollar looting of a state fund.
Najib had already been convicted in his first graft case tied to the 1Malaysia Development Berhad state fund, or 1MBD, scandal and began serving time in 2022 after losing his final appeal in his first graft case.
But he faces other graft trials including Wednesday’s case in which he was jointly charged with ex-treasury chief Irwan Serigar Abdullah with six counts of misappropriating 6.6 billion ringgit ($1.5 billion) in public funds. The money was intended as 1MDB’s settlement payment to Abu Dhabi’s International Petroleum Investment Company.
The Kuala Lumpur High Court discharged the pair after ruling that procedural delays and prosecutors’ failure to hand over key documents were unfair to the defense, said Najib’s lawyer, Muhammad Farhan. A discharge doesn’t mean an acquittal as prosecutors reserve the right to revive charges against them, he said.
“The decision today was based on the non-disclosure of critical documents, six years after the initial charges were brought up, which are relevant to our client’s defense preparation. Therefore the court correctly exercised its jurisdiction to discharge our client of the charges,” Farhan said.
Najib set up 1MDB shortly after taking power in 2009. Investigators allege more than $4.5 billion was stolen from the fund and laundered by his associates to finance Hollywood films and extravagant purchases. The scandal upended Najib’s government and he was defeated in the 2018 election.
Najib, 71, issued a rare apology in October for the scandal “under his watch” but reiterated his innocence.
Last month, he was ordered to enter his defense in another key case that ties him directly to the 1MDB scandal. The court ruled that the prosecution established its case on four charges of abuse of power to obtain over $700 million from the fund that went into Najib’s bank accounts between 2011 and 2014, and 21 counts of money laundering involving the same amount.
In addition, Najib still has another money laundering trial. His wife Rosmah Mansor and other senior government officials also face corruption charges.
