Kyaukphyu activist fined for organising unauthorised talks

By DMG 16 Jun 2022

DMG Newsroom
16 June 2022, Kyaukphyu 

A junta court in Arakan State’s Kyaukphyu Township has imposed a fine on a local activist for violating the Peaceful Assembly and Peaceful Procession Law. 

Ko Tun Kyi was charged with organising unauthorised talks on March 23, 2020, under Section 19 of the Peaceful Assembly Law. The court imposed a fine of K30,000 on Thursday. 

“We held a consultation with local farmers to ensure their rights were not violated in the implementation of the Kyaukphyu Special Economic Zone, and they charged us for failing to seek approval prior to the consultation,” Ko Tun Kyi told DMG. 

He was granted bail three days after he was charged under the Peaceful Assembly Law, but the trial was prolonged because he was away from Kyaukphyu, Ko Tun Kyi explained. 

“Police in ordinary clothes came to my house around 9:40 a.m. today, and took me to the court. I was released after the court imposed a fine of K30,000 on me. That’s all,” he said. 

A villager from Hnan Pe Taung village was charged along with Ko Tun Kyi for organising the March 2020 talks without permission, but the Kyaukphyu Township Court had already imposed a fine on him in May of that year, Ko Tun Kyi added, identifying the other individual as Chan Maung Nu. 

“But I was travelling, and the case was therefore not finished,” he said. 

At the talks for which he was detained and charged, Ko Tun Kyi called on authorities to enact a law that recognises the customary land tenure of local people in the project area before construction of the Kyaukphyu SEZ. Provision of substitute farmlands for locals whose farms will be confiscated for the project, and negotiation with locals for compensation, were also urged. 

Ko Tun Kyi demanded that implementation of the project not begin until all three demands are met. 

In 2012, Ko Tun Kyi founded the Kyaukphyu Rural Development Association to monitor implementation of the Kyaukphyu SEZ. His association has published reports on rights violations local people have suffered in the course of the project’s implementation. 

He was a leading member of a committee that organised a march from Sittwe to Kyaukphyu  in November 2016, which was done as part of a campaign calling for Arakanese people’s rights to natural resources in their state. 

Ko Tun Kyi has also established the Kyaukphyu Center for Peace and Development, which likewise monitors implementation of the Kyaukphyu SEZ. 

During his visit to Myanmar in January 2020, Chinese President Xi Jinping and now-ousted State Counsellor Daw Aung San Suu Kyi signed multiple agreements pertaining to a deep-sea port and related developments tied to the Kyaukphyu SEZ.