Two Burmese journalists who are also active members of a disaster relief organization were arrested recently.
Freelance journalist Pai Soe Oo was arrested in Dagon Seikkan in Rangoon on 28 October 2009, along with several members of a Cyclone Nargis disaster relief volunteer group named "Lin Let Kye" ("Shining Star").
The Burmese translator-editor of the "Foreign Affairs Weekly" and also a Lin Let Kye member, Thant Zin Soe, was arrested on 26 October.
Pai Soe Oo, 23, was picked up in his Yuzana Housing Apartment in Dagon Seikkan Township at 9 p.m. for questioning. A former reporter of "Favorite" and "Pyi Myanmar" weeklies, Pai Soe Oo is also a blogger.
"Three persons wearing USDA badges and three local officials came and said that he would be taken to the Home Ministry. They didn't allow me to accompany him, saying they would return tomorrow," a friend of Pai Soe Oo told Mizzima.
Following a search of his home, the officials confiscated a notebook containing a list of names of the disaster relief group members.
The Lin Let Kye volunteer group was formed in early May 2008 and has over 40 members. Most of them are Rangoon-based reporters and young social activists. They help orphaned schoolchildren by providing them with textbooks and paying for their school expenses.
A Home Ministry office official denied that they are detaining Pai Soe Oo .
"We visited the Home Ministry office this morning when he did not come back. The police personnel at the gate kept us waiting for over three hours. And then the gatekeeper appeared and told us that there was no detainee in the office. He suggested we inquire about him at the office of the local authority and the local police station," one of those, who visited the Home Ministry office, said.
The other members of Lin Let Kye who were arrested on 26 October were identified as Ka Gyi, Zaw Gyi, Lai Ron, Shwe Moe and Aung Myat Kyaw Thu. Their whereabouts are still unknown.
Some Lin Let Kye members are on the run as authorities continue to track them down.
The authorities last year arrested famous comedian and film director Thura a.k.a. Zarganar and sports journalist Zaw Thet Htwe, while they were doing volunteer service for Cyclone Nargis victims. They were sentenced to long prison terms.
