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YANGON, NOVEMBER 19: Myanmar's military junta freed prominent political prisoners today during a mass release of 4,000 people arrested ‘‘inappropriately’’ by the dismantled intelligence organisation of purged prime minister Khin Nyunt.
Min Ko Naing, leader of Myanmar’s 1988 student democracy protests, and Win Tin, a high-profile aide to Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who remains under house arrest, were among those freed. Ko Naing and Win Tin were jailed in 1989, the year before Suu Kyi and the National League for Democracy (NLD) won a landslide election victory, only to be denied power by the ruling generals.
State-run media announced the release yesterday, saying 3,937 prisoners would be set free because ‘‘they were inappropriately arrested by the National Intelligence Bureau that was dissolved on October 22.’’
