55 French mayors call for Win Tin's release from jail

Fifty-five mayors of towns all over France have signed a Reporters Without Borders (Reporters Sans Frontières) petition calling for the immediate release of Burmese journalist Win Tin, who has been imprisoned for the past 13 years and is now 72 years old. Burma's most famous journalist, also a close adviser of Aung San Suu Kyi, leader of the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD), has now spent more than 4,380 days in jail since his arrest on 4 July 1989. The petition was organised with the help of the monthly magazine Maires de France, which supports the journalist. Despite his poor health, the country's military rulers decided at the end of May to return him to his special cell at Rangoon's Insein after several months in the city's general hospital, where he was convalescing after a hernia operation. His condition is stable at present but his return to prison could put his life in danger, as he has suffered from high blood pressure, diabetes and spondylitis (inflammation of the vertebrae) during his 13 years in jail. Win Tin, former editor of the daily newspaper Hanthawathi and vice-president of the Burmese Writers' Association, was sentenced to a total of 20 years in prison, mainly for having sent details of prison conditions and ill-treatment in Insein jail to the UN Rapporteur for Burma. The authorities have several times offered to free him in exchange for his resignation from the NLD. He has always refused. Reporters Without Borders knows of at least 16 journalists still imprisoned in Burma. It is particularly concerned about Sein Hla Oo, whose sentence expired last August but who has still not been released. His family has not been allowed to visit him for several months.