LONDON, Sept 3 (KUNA) -- British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt plans to visit Myanmar soon to discuss the issue of two imprisoned British journalists who were reporting on the violent government crackdown on Rohingya Muslims there.
A court in Myanmar handed Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, who both work for news agency Reuters, a seven-year sentence for breaching the country's state secrets law.
"Imprisoning journalists who write about inconvenient truths is an unconscionable blow to press freedom, and indeed everyone's freedom," tweeted Hunt.
In a statement, the Foreign Office's Minister for Asia and the Pacific, Mark Field, said he was "extremely disappointed" at the decision.
"Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, have today been found guilty and sentenced to 7 years imprisonment for nothing more than doing their jobs.
"They provided valuable reporting on abhorrent human rights violations in Rakhine State, and I have consistently called for their immediate release, including directly with the Burmese government," he said.
Some 700,000 people of the Rohingya community are currently living as refugees in neighboring Bangladesh having fled their homes after being targeted by Myanmar authorities.
Both the United Nations and the US have described the government raids as ethnic cleansing. (end) kd.sd