The arrests of two journalists covering Rakhine, the site of a brutal military crackdown on Rohingya, were criticized as an attack on press freedom.
HONG KONG — A court in Myanmar extended the detention of two Reuters journalists for another 14 days, despite international condemnation of their arrests as an attack on press freedom.
The journalists, U Wa Lone, 31, and U Kyaw Soe Oo, 27, were arrested while reporting on Rakhine State, where Myanmar’s military has taken part in a campaign of killings, rape and arson that has sent more than 655,000 Rohingya Muslims fleeing into Bangladesh. The two were charged with violating Myanmar’s Official Secrets Act, a broad colonial-era law that carries a maximum sentence of 14 years.
Mr. Wa Lone and Mr. Kyaw Soe Oo were arrested on Dec. 12 after having obtained photographs from residents of a village in which, the army’s chief said, a mass grave was found .
The arrests came just weeks after a judge sentenced two other foreign journalists, their interpreter and their driver to two months in prison on charges of filming with a drone without official permission. On Tuesday, the police dropped additional charges that were filed in that case, which could pave the way for the release of the four in January.
Mr. Wa Lone and Mr. Kyaw Soe Oo appeared briefly in court in Yangon, the country’s largest city and former capital, on Wednesday. They were allowed to meet their families for the first time since their arrests.
“Luckily, I had chance to talk with my husband,” Pan Ei Mon, the wife of Mr. Wa Lone, said after the hearing. “Even though they didn’t mistreat my husband, my husband did not do anything wrong. He is doing his job professionally. I just want my hubby to be released soon.”
Reuters would not say what specifically the reporters were pursuing when they were arrested. But Stephen J. Adler, the news agency’s president and editor in chief, has said the two journalists were performing “a crucial role in shedding light on news of global interest, and they are innocent of any wrongdoing.”
The United States, which has cultivated closer ties with Myanmar in recent years, called the arrests “highly irregular.” The secretary general of the United Nations, António Guterres, said the arrests were reflective of eroding freedoms generally in the country.
