As the American editor Danny Fenster spent 100 days detained in Yangon today, his family called for his immediate release.
The junta has allowed minimal contact with Frontier Myanmar editor Fenster, 37 – a few 20-minute phone calls in which US embassy staff hold together one phone connected to Insein Prison and another connected to his parents and brother in Detroit.
The prison has cited Covid-19 rules for its ban on in-person meetings, but no one can explain why he is still yet to be formally charged. The judge, who has continuously remanded Fenster every fortnight without giving him a proper hearing, is next set to review the case on September 6.
In his hometown, his father Buddy wakes up at 6.30am – “it’s 5pm in Myanmar,” he said. “When I’m starting my day, I realise my son has lost another day being unjustly, falsely imprisoned for no crime whatsoever.”
Fenster had been working for the outlet for around a year and was heading home to see his family in the US when he was arrested at Yangon International Airport on May 24.
The junta has stated that Fenster was detained because of his work with Myanmar Now, a news outlet that the regime banned on March 8. Myanmar Now has continued to provide important coverage of the fallout from the coup on February 1, prompting police to open a case against the outlet under the incitement charge of Penal Code’s Section 505(a).
But Fenster has not worked for Myanmar Now since July 2020 when he took a position at Frontier Myanmar. Phone calls and letters overseen by the military, his parents gauge the tone of his voice to intuit his welfare. During the last permitted conversation, on August 1, Fenster said he was recovering from Covid-like symptoms. His parents believe he has not been vaccinated or tested for the virus.
His brother, Bryan, said he has maintained his sense of humour but “you can feel and hear the frustration and anxiety in his voice”.
“We want him to get the sense we are doing everything we can, without being too specific because there are people around him listening,” he added.
Fenster’s family described the journalist as a deep thinker who uses his talents as a storyteller to create empathy and speak out for the marginalised. On August 30, he was named a 2021 John Aubuchon Press Freedom Award honoree by the National Press Club.
Wearing a #FreeDanny t-shirt, his mother Rose thanked everyone working for his release, including the media, for “keeping his story alive and showing what a good human he is”.
