Burma’s military government continues to crack down on the country’s struggling independent media, most recently by the arrest last week of Rangoon-based journalists Thet Zin and Sein Win Maung—respectively the editor and office manager of the Myanmar Nation weekly news journal.

The two journalists were arrested when police and intelligence officers carried out a four-hour search of their offices and confiscated documents, including a copy of UN Special Rapporteur Paulo Sergio Pinheiro's report on Burma, Shan ethnic leader Shwe Ohn’s book on federalism, a VCD on the September uprising and poems. The two journalists were taken to the headquarters of the interior ministry.

It was unclear under what specific charges the two journalists are being held. However, Rangoon-based journalists suggest their arrests stemmed from the news journal’s principles of journalistic integrity. Unlike some publications, the Myanmar Nation didn’t have a cozy relationship with the junta's villainous Information Minister Kyaw Hsan.

Furthermore, the editor, Thet Zin, has been an anti-government activist and critic. He was arrested and tortured in 1988 for taking part in the student pro-democracy protests at Rangoon University, and he was occasionally detained and interrogated by officials throughout the 1990s.

Four days after the arrests, the authorities raided the publication again. Later, the censorship board, the Press Scrutiny and Registration Division, instructed the publisher to stop publishing the weekly journal.

Such actions by the junta against the Burmese media have never ceased.

According to Rangoon-based journalists, the military authorities recently banned reporters from covering a number of governmental meetings which, in the past, they attended. The reporters, who were intensively questioned, were not allowed to enter the meetings of the Myanmar Construction Entrepreneurs Association, the Myanmar Info-Tech Meeting and the Myanmar Forest Products & Timber Merchants Association.

The latest harassment and sanctions against news media follow recent official statements on the press.

Several Rangoon newspapers were ordered to publish government-written opinion pieces characterizing the pro-democracy protests as a threat to national security.

However, a new generation of journalists—citizen reporters and bloggers—continue to challenge press censorship through the Internet and other technology. Their efforts began during the September 2007 uprising when they played a key role in reporting the junta’s brutality to the world.

In response, the authorities have reduced Internet speed and bandwidth, making it more difficult to send and receive high resolution images and large files. The government action hit many Internet cafés which are the only places for many people to get access the World Wide Web. Users are now desperately complaining to owners about the inadequate connection speed.

Many Burma observers now suspect that authorities are pursuing a policy of repression rather than reform, even as plans go ahead for a constitutional referendum in May.

Brad Adams, the Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said, "The arrests of journalists and repression of access to information deny the Burmese people any real opportunity to debate the proposed new constitution."

Instead of focusing on how to unite and rebuild the country, Burma’s mind-control experts are tearing down the country's struggling press.

The regime is trying to ensure that democracy has no chance in Burma by eliminating all possibility of a free press and freedom of speech.

The junta should immediately stop the arrests of journalists, citizen reporters and bloggers and unconditionally release them from detention and prison so that they may serve the country at this critical time in its history.