28 March 2018•Update: 28 March 2018
By Kyaw Ye Lynn
YANGON, Myanmar
A Myanmar court on Wednesday has given a man two-year jail sentence for revealing his life as child soldier, according to his family member.
Aung Ko Htwe, a former child soldier, was arrested and charged under Article 505 (b) of the country’s Penal Code last August after telling the media how he was kidnapped by the Myanmar military in 2005 when he was a teenager.
On Wednesday, the judge handed down the sentence to him under the sedition charge in a court in Dagon Seikkan Township of Yangon.
Speaking to Anadolu Agency, Htwe’s sister Nay Zar Tun said: "I have no idea what is wrong in telling how he became child soldier."
"The military already admitted that they had used child soldiers," she said, adding: “It seems they are still using child soldiers."
Aung Ko Htwe, a resident of Yangon, shared his long struggle with the Radio Free Asia (RFA) Burmese Service in early August last year.
He received a death sentence in 2007 for accidentally murdering a motorbike owner during an effort to escape from the military camp in restive Shan state, his sister said.
The penalty was later commuted to 10 years’ imprisonment.
The Myanmar military said it has discharged 849 underage and young people from its ranks, and demoted or jailed 439 troops including 87 officers for the use and recruitment of child soldiers since a 2012 agreement with the UN to stop using child soldiers.
