Prison Dept lodges complaint with Press Council against The Voice

07 April 2018
Prison Dept lodges complaint with Press Council against The Voice
Concern was expressed by the Prison Department that the report was not correct.  Photo: Thura/Mizzima

Press Council joint secretary Kyaw Swar Min confirmed to Mizzima that the prison department lodged a complaint with them against “The Voice” which reported that 10,000 prisoners would be released from prisons.
“Yes, they lodged complaint to us against ‘The Voice’. The complaint was dated March 26 but it was given to us in person only on 4th of this month. And then we told them to give us the complaint in proper form but we do not receive yet their reply until today, April 6,” Kyaw Swar Min said.
The prison department lodged the complaint against ‘The Voice’ to the press council on the news story entitled “Plan to release about 10,000 prisoners from prisons in April” after it appeared on The Voice Daily on March 21.
In this news, The Voice Daily reported that State-level authorities had a plan to give pardon to about 10,000 prisoners from their sentences on the coming Myanmar lunar new year’s day which falls this year on April 17, citing a senior official from the Ministry of Home Affairs.
But Prison Department issued a press release on March 23 to say the news is not true and its publication could lead to incidents which will undermine prison security.
There are total 46 prisons across the country and about 70,000 prisoners are serving sentences or detained in these prisons.