Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has been pardoned in five out of 19 criminal cases against her in a military government amnesty.
"Six years imprisonment will be reduced," junta spokesman Zaw Min Tun told reporters on Tuesday, explaining that the reduction related to only five of the 19 criminal cases against the 78-year-old democracy icon.
The announcement was part of an amnesty of more than 7,000 prisoners to mark Buddhist Lent. Myanmar frequently grants amnesty to thousands of prisoners to commemorate holidays or special Buddhist dates.
The ex-president, who has been in detention since she was ousted in a 2021 military coup, is serving a 33-year jail term for an array of charges, including corruption, possession of illegal walkie talkies and flouting coronavirus restrictions.
Myanmar Radio and Television reported the pardons by the Chairman of State Administration Council Earlier on Tuesday, but an informed source said Suu Kyi would remain in detention.
House arrest
"She won't be free from house arrest," said the source who declined to be identified due to the sensitivity of the issue.
Suu Kyi, 78, the daughter of Myanmar's independence hero, was first put under house arrest in 1989 after huge protests against decades of military rule.
In 1991, she won the Nobel Peace Prize for campaigning for democracy but was only fully released from house arrest in 2010. She swept a 2015 election, held as part of tentative military reforms that were brought to a halt by the 2021 coup.
Suu Kyi has only been seen once since she was held after the February 1, 2021 putsch - in grainy state media photos from a bare courtroom.
The coup plunged the South-East Asian nation into a conflict that has displaced more than one million people, according to the United Nations.
Last week, Suu Kyi was moved from prison to house arrest in the capital Naypyidaw, according to an official from her political party. She is appealing the convictions for the various charges against her.
