Myanmar frees nearly 4,900 prisoners including some political detainees

BANGKOK (AP) — The head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to nearly 4,900 prisoners to mark the country's traditional new year, state-run media reported Thursday, and an independent watchdog said they included at least 22 political detainees.

At least 19 buses with prisoners aboard left Yangon's Insein prison and were welcomed outside the gate by excited family members and friends who had been waiting since early morning.

Political Prisoners Network - Myanmar, an independent watchdog group that records violations of human rights in Myanmar’s prisons, said in a statement that by its initial count, 22 political prisoners had been freed.

Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, the head of the ruling military council, pardoned 4,893 prisoners, MRTV reported. Thirteen foreigners will also be released and deported from Myanmar, it said in a separate statement.

Other prisoners received reduced sentences, except for those convicted of serious charges such as murder and rape, or those jailed on charges under various other security acts.

If the freed detainees violate the law again, they will have to serve the remainder of their original sentences in addition to any new sentence, according to the terms of their release. Mass amnesties on the holiday are not unusual in Myanmar.

Myanmar has been under military rule since Feb. 1, 2021, when its army ousted civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government. The takeover was met with massive nonviolent resistance, which has since become a widespread armed struggle. The country is now in civil war.

Some 22,197 political detainees, including Suu Kyi, were in detention as of last Friday, according to the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, an independent organization that keeps detailed tallies of arrests and casualties linked to the nation’s political conflicts.

Many political detainees had been held on a charge of incitement, a catch-all offense widely used to arrest critics of the government or military and punishable by up to three years in prison.

Among those imprisoned for incitement who were freed Thursday was the film director who works under the name of Steel and is also known as Dwe Myittar. He was arrested in March 2023 and had been held in Insein Prison.

Also released, according to the independent online news outlet Myanmar Now, was Hanthar Nyein, a news producer for Kamayut Media, who was arrested in March 2021 along with co-founder U.S. journalist Nathan Maung after the authorities raided their office in Yangon. Maung was released and deported to the U.S in June of that year.

Hanthar Nyein had been handed a total of seven years' imprisonment after being convicted of incitement in March 2022, and violating the Electronics Transactions Law, a charge that critics say criminalizes free speech, in December that same year.

Maung told the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists that he and Hanthar Nyein were blindfolded, beaten, deprived of food and water and otherwise tortured during interrogations in Yangon, Myanmar’s biggest city.

More than 220 journalists have been detained since the army ousted the elected government in February 2021, according to the U.S.-based International Center for Not-for-Profit Law, with at least 51 still imprisoned by February this year.

This year’s celebrations of Thingyan, the new year’s holiday, were more reserved than usual due to a nationwide grieving period following a devastating March 28 earthquake that killed about 3,725 people and leveled structures from new condos to ancient pagodas.

In a new year’s speech, Min Aung Hlaing said his government will carry out reconstruction and rehabilitation measures in the quake-affected areas as quickly as possible. He also reaffirmed plans to hold a general election by the end of the year and called on opposition groups fighting the army to resolve the conflicts in political ways.

During the holiday, the violent struggle between the army and pro-democracy forces continued with reports of clashes in the countryside but the number of casualties was unclear.

Family members and colleagues wait to welcome released prisoners outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Released prisoners get out of a bus outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Released prisoners on buses are welcomed by family members and colleagues outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Family members and colleagues wait to welcome released prisoners outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Family members and colleagues wait to welcome released prisoners outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

A person holds a sign of name as family members and colleagues wait to welcome released prisoners outside the main gate of Insein prison Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Released prisoners get out of a bus outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

A released prisoner, center, is welcomed by family members outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Family members and colleagues wait to welcome released prisoners outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Released prisoner on bus are welcomed by family members and colleagues outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

A released prisoner, center, is welcomed by family members outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

A released prisoner, center right, is welcomed by family members outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

A released prisoner, center, is welcomed by family members outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Family members and colleagues wait to welcome released prisoners outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Released prisoners on a bus are welcomed by family members and colleagues outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

A released prisoner, center, is welcomed by family members outside the main gate of Insein prison as the head of Myanmar’s military government granted amnesty to thousands of prisoners to mark the country's traditional New Year Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

Family members and colleagues wait to welcome released prisoners outside the main gate of Insein prison during the country's traditional New Year day on Thursday, April 17, 2025, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AP Photo/Thein Zaw)

In this photo released by Thailand's Foreign Affairs Ministry, Myanmar's military leader Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, attends the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (6 th BIMSTEC) summit in Bangkok, Thailand, Friday, April 4, 2025. (Thailand's Foreign Affairs Ministry via AP)

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Iran fired a new wave of missile attacks on Israel early Monday, triggering air raid sirens across the country as emergency services reported at least five killed and dozens more wounded in the fourth day of open warfare between the regional foes that showed no sign of slowing.

Iran announced it had launched some 100 missiles and vowed further retaliation for Israel's sweeping attacks on its military and nuclear infrastructure, which have killed at least 224 people in the country since last Friday.

The attacks raised Israel’s total death toll to at least 18, and in response the Israeli military said fighter jets had struck 10 command centers in Tehran belonging to Iran's Quds Force, an elite arm of its Revolutionary Guard that conducts military and intelligence operations outside Iran.

Powerful explosions, likely from Israel’s defense systems intercepting Iranian missiles, rocked Tel Aviv shortly before dawn on Monday, sending plumes of black smoke into the sky over the coastal city.

Authorities in the central Israeli city of Petah Tikva said that Iranian missiles had hit a residential building there, charring concrete walls, shattering windows and ripping the walls off multiple apartments.

The Israeli Magen David Adom emergency service reported that two women and two men — all in their 70s — and one other person were killed in the wave of missile attacks that struck four sites in central Israel.

“We clearly see that our civilians are being targeted,” said Israeli police spokesman Dean Elsdunne outside the bombed-out building in Petah Tikva. “And this is just one scene. We have other sites like this near the coast, in the south.”

Petah Tikva resident Yoram Suki rushed with his family to a shelter after hearing an air raid alert, and emerged after it was over to find his apartment destroyed.

“Thank God we were OK,” the 60-year-old said.

Despite losing his home, he urged Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to keep up the attacks on Iran.

“It's totally worth it,” he said. “This is for the sake of our children and grandchildren.”

In addition to those killed, the MDA said paramedics had evacuated another 87 wounded people to hospitals, including a 30-year-old woman in serious condition, while rescuers were still searching for residents trapped beneath the rubble of their homes.

“When we arrived at the scene of the rocket strike, we saw massive destruction,” said Dr. Gal Rosen, a paramedic with MDA who said he had rescued a 4-day-old baby as fires blazed from the building.

During an earlier barrage of Iranian missiles on central Israel on Sunday, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said that Iran will stop its strikes if Israel does the same.

But after a day of intensive Israeli aerial attacks that extended targets beyond military installations to hit oil refineries and government buildings, the Revolutionary Guard struck a hard line on Monday, vowing that further rounds of strikes would be “more forceful, severe, precise and destructive than previous ones."

Health authorities also reported that 1,277 were wounded in Iran, without distinguishing between military officials and civilians.

Rights groups, like the Washington-based Iranian advocacy group called Human Rights Activists, have suggested that the Iranian government’s death toll is a significant undercount. Human Rights Activists says it has documented more than 400 people killed, among them 197 civilians.

Israel argues that its assault on Iran's top military leaders, uranium enrichment sites and nuclear scientists was necessary to stop Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

Iran has always insisted its nuclear program is peaceful, and the U.S. and others have assessed that Tehran has not pursued a nuclear weapon since 2003.

But Iran has enriched ever-larger stockpiles of uranium to near weapons-grade levels in recent years and was believed to have the capacity to develop multiple weapons within months if it chose to do so.

Isaac Scharf in Jerusalem, Isabel DeBre in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and David Rising in Bangkok contributed to this report.

People evacuate after a missile launched from Iran struck Tel Aviv, Israel, Monday June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)

Rescue team work at the site where a missile launched from Iran struck Tel Aviv, Israel, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)

Firefighters work to extinguish a blaze after a missile launched from Iran struck Tel Aviv, Israel, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)

An explosion is seen during a missile attack in Tel Aviv, Israel, Sunday, June 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)

The Israeli Iron Dome air defense system fires to intercept missiles during an Iranian attack over Tel Aviv, Israel, Sunday, June 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Leo Correa)

People evacuate after a missile launched from Iran struck Tel Aviv, Israel, Monday June 16, 2025. (AP Photo/Baz Ratner)