Judge U Ye Lwin, who has been presiding over the trial, said the men have been charged for “getting, collecting and transferring secret documents regarding operations of the [Myanmar] police force.”

The charging decision means the case against them will now be brought to trial, dragging out the case for several more weeks. After six months of pre-trial hearings, a court is set to decide on Monday whether or not to charge the reporters under the Official Secrets Act, which carries a maximum penalty of 14 years in prison. Both journalists pleaded “not guilty” to the charges, telling the judge they had “followed journalistic ethics.”

Speaking to reporters after the ruling, Wa Lone said he and Kyaw Soe Oo had committed no crime and would testify to their innocence in court. Sean Bain, a legal adviser for the International Commission of Jurists in Yangon said the decision “raises real concerns about the independence and impartiality of the judiciary and prosecution when confronted with politically sensitive cases.”

In a statement Monday, Reuters President and Editor-in-Chief Stephen J. Adler called the trial a “protracted and baseless proceeding.”

“These Reuters journalists were doing their jobs in an independent and impartial way, and there are no facts of evidence to suggest that they’ve done anything wrong or broken any law.” he said. “We are extremely disappointed with the decision to charge them,’’ Danish deputy head of mission in Myanmar Dorte Chortsen said after Monday’s ruling. The two Reuters journalists arrested in Myanmar in December while investigating the brutal army crackdown against Rohingya Muslims in western Rakhine state have pleaded not guilty after a judge ruled that they would face charges under the country’s colonial-era Official Secrets Act. Meet the Journalists Fighting Back

Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo were arrested outside a restaurant in Yangon in December, and charged with handling government documents supposedly relating to the Myanmar military’s crackdown in Rakhine state that has forced more than 700,000 Rohingya to flee into neighboring Bangladesh since August. The prosecution’s case has come under considerable scrutiny after a witness called on behalf of the prosecution, Police Captain Moe Yan Naing, told the court in April that officers had been ordered by their superiors to “entrap” Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo. The officer has since been sentenced to a year in prison for violating the police force’s disciplinary code, and his family was evicted from their home in what the government said was an unrelated matter.
A court in Myanmar charges two Reuters journalists with obtaining secret state documents in violation of the colonial-era Official Secrets Act, taking the landmark press freedom case to trial after a period of preliminary hearings that lasted six months. The two journalists were investigating mass graves in the village of Inn Din in northern Rakhine State prior to their arrest and imprisonment on 12 December 2017.