Nang Khin Htwe Myint

Nang Khin Htwe is a Burmese Politician born on May 10, 1954. She was born to Ahmar and Dr. Saw Hla Tun, the former Chief Minister of the Kayin State. Her political activism career started during her time at the Rangoon Institute of Economics. During her second year there, she was involved with the June Student Demonstration, where they protested for five days against the military government. In 1975, Nang Khin and 212 other students were rounded up in the pagoda district of Rangoon and subsequently imprisoned by the military government. The government then deemed it illegal to have public assemblies and demonstrations. This set off a wave of more protests for the coming months, which led the government to close Burmese universities.

After being imprisoned for the demonstrations, Nang Khin was released in 1978. She was politically quiet for a few years until she was elected as the Pyithu Hluttaw MP for Constituency No. 3 of Kayin State in the 1990 elections. She had an overwhelming majority of 74% of the votes, but in the end, was not allowed to assume her seat. On February 10, 1998, she was arrested again by intelligence officers who followed her from her house to the Rangoon 51st Anniversary of Union Day celebration. She was allegedly targeted because of an earlier argument with Major Khin Maung Kyi, who was the commander of the intelligence agency that arrested her. She was arrested and convicted under Penal Code Article 353 after arguing with intelligence officers who were searching her bag and didn’t return all the items. While in prison, she was denied legal representation. She was released in February 2020.

In the 2012 Election, she won the MP seat for Kayin State, and in the 2015 Myanmar General Election she was elected Chief Minister of Kayin State. After the 2021 Myanmar coup on February 1, Nang Khin was detained by the Myanmar Armed Forces. She was found guilty of five corruption charges with each assigned 15 years for a total of 75 years in prison. She was sentenced to the maximum charge, as predicted by the circumstances of the case. Some of the sentences include corruption through using state funds to pay for her medical bills and moving money for public projects to a private bank. When asked about her charges, Nang Khin said that she felt “no sense in saying whether it’s fair or not.” Initially, she was put on house arrest, but after a video surfaced that she made of her calling soldiers to unite with the public, she was arrested again and put in Hpa-an prison.