Myanmar's Crackdown on Free Press Driving Journalists to Thailand
Voice of America
BANGKOK - On an early April evening in a thick patch of jungle in eastern Myanmar, Win, a journalist with a local news outlet, waited anxiously for nightfall before slipping across a quiet stretch of border and safely into Thailand.
Reporters Without Borders and Human Rights Watch say he is one of dozens of journalists who have fled Myanmar for Thailand since Myanmar's military seized power on February 1 to escape a crackdown on the country's free press. Like Win, many, if not most, crossed illegally. They fear arrest by Thai authorities and what Myanmar's junta may do to them if they are caught and sent back. "They will torture [me] for sure," said Win, whose news outlet has been blacklisted by the junta, its offices raided by police and some of its reporters arrested and put on trial. He asked that his full name be withheld for his safety.
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