OnlyFans Model Jailed for ‘Harming Culture’ After Junta Protests

A well-liked OnlyFans mannequin was sentenced to 6 years in jail Monday following her involvement in protests in opposition to Myanmar’s navy junta.

A navy tribunal hammered 34-year-old mannequin Nange Mwe San, a former physician with a profitable OnlyFans account, with a six-year jail sentence for “harming culture and dignity,” according to the unbiased Burmese information supply Democratic Voice of Burma. Radio Free Asia spoke to an unnamed good friend of the jailed mannequin, who confirmed the sentence got here after a near-month-long trial.

Before her arrest, Nange Mwe San was usually outspoken in opposition to the navy dictatorship that ousted the democratically elected authorities in February 2021. She was prosecuted by the ruling navy dictatorship beneath Section 33a of Electronic Transactions Law, DVB wrote, based mostly on an interview with an unnamed lawyer near the case. She had been denied a lawyer and was sentenced in a closed navy courtroom. She is the doubtless first lady to be jailed for ostensibly publishing content material to OnlyFans within the nation.

According to a report from Vice, Nang Mwe San had uploaded 74 movies and near 350 pictures to her OnlyFans account. She had informed Vice in a previous report that “Women in this country shouldn’t feel bad about what they are doing.”

Aung Kyaw Moe, an advisor who works for the shadow authorities Myanmar’s National Unity Government and self-professed member of the Rohingya group, informed Vice that if Nang Mwe San “is not free to exercise her rights to sell sexy photos, no other woman is free to exercise their rights.”

The Section 33a statute broadly threatens customers with jail time for actions “detrimental to security of the state or prevalence of law and order or community peace and tranquility or national solidarity or national economy or national culture.” The legislation was put in place in 2004 by the nation’s earlier navy dictatorship however had by no means been repealed, based on a 2013 report by Human Rights Watch. It has had a chilling impact on web speech, particularly for many who put up grownup content material on-line.

Because Nang Mwe San is from the North Dagon township, which lingers beneath martial legislation for ongoing protests in opposition to the navy junta, she was hit with a fast sentence by the navy itself, based on DVB.

The unbiased media group Myanmar Now reported in August, based mostly on Junta-controlled media experiences, that the navy authorities had arrested Nang Mwe San concurrently movie actor Thinszar Wint Kyaw, who’s dealing with the identical expenses. The latter additionally reportedly posted footage of herself on Exantria, a website much like OnlyFans that’s standard in Myanmar. Nang Mwe San was also active on Exantria, however since Thinzar Wint Kyaw was from a province not beneath martial legislation, her case is being tried in civil courtroom, based on Radio Free Asia.

But as a lot because the nation’s navy dictatorship needs to make this a case about Burmese tradition, human rights teams and anti-Myanmar junta activists have condemned the arrests and sentencing as politically motivated. Thinszar Wint Kyaw had beforehand been seen at a marriage carrying a uniform of the Shan State Progressive Party, a guerilla outfit that’s battled on and off with Myanmar’s navy for years.

An unnamed Burmese lawyer cited by RFA decried the ruling, saying, “Myanmar’s culture will not benefit” from these arrests. The lawyer added that Section 33 of the ECA is just too imprecise of what’s thought of “harmful” to the nation’s tradition.

Post-coup, the Burmese navy has arrested roughly 15,586 folks and killed one other 2,326, based on advocacy group Assistance Association for Political Prisoners. The ruling junta has continued its genocidal rampage in opposition to the Muslim-majority Rohingya those that began in 2016 beneath the democratic authorities.