Myanmar's opposition party says political prisoners denied proper medical care

YANGON, Myanmar: Myanmar's military junta is intentionally denying proper medical care to political prisoners, the country's pro-democracy party said Wednesday.

National League for Democracy spokesman Nyan Win said the junta's withholding of medical treatment was a deliberate and malicious act.

Nyan Win made the comment a day after State Department spokesman Tom Casey said the United States had received reports that pro-democracy activist Min Ko Naing has been denied care for an eye infection that could cause blindness. He said the U.S. was also worried that Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who is under house arrest, has not received promised monthly doctor visits.

Suu Kyi underwent major gynecological surgery in September 2003 and suffered a serious stomach ailment in June 2006.

In rare photos taken after her two meetings with U.N. special envoy Ibrahim Gambari last year, the 62-year-old leader of the National League for Democracy appeared tired and gaunt.

Suu Kyi has been in detention for more than 12 of the past 18 years and is not allowed visitors or telephone contact with the outside world. Nyan Win said Suu Kyi has not been seen by her physician since January.

Calls to the junta's public relations officials went unanswered Wednesday.

Nyan Win said Min Ko Naing's eye infection needs urgent medical treatment.

Min Ko Naing, leader of the 88 Generation Students group, and more than a dozen other activists were arrested last August after holding anti-junta rallies. He has been held in Yangon's notorious Insein prison.

In September monks led nationwide demonstrations. At least 31 people were killed when the military crushed the protests, sparking global outrage.

Nyan Win earlier said more than 120 National League for Democracy members have been arrested since the crackdown. Thousands of other protesters were also detained and some were given harsh prison sentences.

Members of the 88 Generation Students were at the forefront of a 1988 pro-democracy uprising and were given lengthy prison terms and tortured after the military harshly suppressed the protests.

The Assistance Association of Political Prisoners, a group of former political prisoners based near the Thai-Myanmar border, says Myanmar authorities have long used denial of medical treatment for political intimidation.

It said a 70-year-old political prisoner, Than Lwin, lost his eyesight earlier this year when authorities were slow to allow him medical treatment while he was imprisoned in the central city of Mandalay.

"When he was sent to an eye specialist, the doctors said it was already about two months late," the group said in a recent statement. "There was nothing they could do to help him."

Source: AP