JAKARTA - The Myanmar government announced that all death row inmates in the country would be replaced with life imprisonment in the first amnesty measure set by the country's new president.
President Min Aung Hlaing on Friday, April 17, signed a decision to reduce sentences for prisoners across the country, according to a report by Eleven Myanmar.
Min was just appointed president by Myanmar's Parliament which backed the military earlier this month.
The amnesty in the context of Myanmar's New Year was enacted "considering the peace of the community and humanitarian reasons" for individuals serving sentences in prisons, detention centers, and labor camps for crimes committed before April 17, 2026.
The national-scale pardon is the first to be imposed by Min since ruling Myanmar since the 2021 military coup that ousted the National League for Democracy (NLD) government.
Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the dissolved NLD, was reportedly one of the prisoners who received a pardon. He is now serving a 27-year prison sentence after being convicted in several cases with a total prison sentence of 33 years.
Min has been the commander of Myanmar's armed forces, the Tatmadaw, since 2011 until stepping down from the position in March 2026 to become president.
After five years in power as a junta, Min's regime held elections in three stages last December, with pro-military parties, including the Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP), winning big.
According to the Myanmar political prisoners association, a total of 30,870 people have been detained since the 2021 coup, of which 8,700 have since been released.
In addition, 7,972 people have died in the unrest in Myanmar over the past five years, the association said.
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