US journalist Danny Finster released from prison in Myanmar | Myanmar

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American journalist Danny Finster has been released from prison in Myanmar, three days after he was sentenced to 11 years in prison for sedition, immigration violations and terrorism.

The former US ambassador to the United Nations, Bill Richardson, said that Finster was released and handed over to him in Myanmar and will soon arrive in his country via Qatar.

Finster, managing editor of online magazine Frontier Myanmar, was convicted on Friday of publishing false or inflammatory information, contacting illegal organizations and violating visa regulations, and was sentenced to 11 years in prison with hard labor.

Richardson is heartbroken that he negotiated Finster’s release during a recent visit to Myanmar when he held face-to-face meetings with the military leader who ousted the elected government of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi in February.

“Great news. I heard DannyFenster is out,” said Sonny Soe, publisher of Frontier Myanmar, the employer of Finster, on Twitter.

A spokesman for Myanmar’s ruling military council did not immediately respond to separate requests for comment.

Finster, 37, was arrested in May while trying to leave Myanmar, a country that has been in chaos since a military coup in February.

He was the first Western journalist to be sentenced to prison in recent years in Myanmar, where the coup against the elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi ended a decade of tentative steps toward democracy and sparked nationwide protests.

The army arrested dozens of journalists out of thousands of detainees after protests erupted across the country.

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