The U.S. government sought the help of Yohei Sasakawa, Japan's special envoy for national reconciliation in Myanmar, to win the freedom of an American journalist who had been given an 11-year prison sentence by a military court, the envoy revealed Thursday.
Sasakawa, chairman of the philanthropic Nippon Foundation, made the remarks in an interview amid a "personal" visit to Myanmar, where the military ousted the elected government of civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi last February.
He said he was asked by the U.S. government to intercede with the military in the case of Danny Fenster, the managing editor of online news magazine Frontier Myanmar, who was arrested on May 24 at Yangon's airport, charged with dissemination of false information and other offenses, and sentenced last Friday to 11 years in jail.