The hate-preaching Buddhist monk Wirathu will be tried in absentia after evading arrest for sedition charges issued late last month, a court in Yangon said on Tuesday.
Police have failed to apprehend the notorious monk despite searching his Mandalay monastery and conducting a five-day stakeout at an address in Yangon that was suspected of harboring him.
He was hit with a sedition charge, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment, after giving a speech in Yangon in late May railing against the government’s efforts to amend the military-drafted constitution.
Rights advocates have expressed anger that Wirathu has been charged for criticising the government rather than for his hate speech targeting minority Muslims.
Yangon’s western district court will begin questioning witnesses, including police and administrators involved in filing charges against the monk, on 18 June.
If Wirathu is not arrested before the plaintiff witnesses have finished giving their testimony, a judgement will be issued against him without hearing any arguments in his defense, said Kyee Myint, a lawyer who is not involved in the case.
“He won’t have a chance to defend himself,” he told Myanmar Now. “The law doesn’t wait until he shows up. We will have a default judgment after all the witnesses called by the plaintiff are questioned.
However, if Wirathu turns himself in or is caught while the hearing is in progress, the witnesses will be re-examined, said Kyaw Hoe, an advocate from the Union Legal Supporting Group.
“Witness can be lost or pass away if too much time has passed. That’s why they have to question the witness first once they are sure the defendant has run away,” he said.
If Wirathu remains on the run after all the plaintiff witnesses have testified, the court will set a time limit for him to appear at court, then if he fails to show a judgment will be issued, the experts said.
That judgement would be considered final and would not be reversed even if the defendant was caught.
Police officers and ward administrators told a judge on Tuesday that they had monitored an address in Yangon’s Dagon Myo Thit between 5 and 10 June where they thought Wirathu might be hiding but concluded he wasn’t there.
Despite going into hiding and being declared a fugitive, he has continued to post videos to the Russian social media platform VK.
On Monday, police arrested another nationalist fugitive.
Michael Kyaw Myint, the alleged ringleader of an anti-Muslim mob that forced Muslims to halt their Ramadan prayers last month, was detained at his parent-in-laws’ home in Mandalay under section 505b, which prohibits causing “fear or alarm” to the public.
