In the country's march towards democracy, private newspapers have begun to hit newsstands in Myanmar for the first time in 50 years.
Four of the 16 private daily newspapers for which the government granted temporary license to resume publication appeared on Monday.
One of them - Pyidaungsu Daily (Union Daily) - is run by the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP). There are some six state-owned newspapers published daily in the South Asian country ruled by the military for more than half a century. More than 20 offices of foreign news agencies are also operating in the country.
All the private dailies in Burmese, English, Indian and Chinese languages were forced to stop publication when the former British colony came under military rule in 1964. Subsequently, journalists were frequently subjected to surveillance and phone-tapping, and were often tortured or imprisoned. But the government's control over media was relaxed as part of reforms initiated by the government of President Thein Sein, a former Army General, who assumed office in 2011.
China, Japan and Western countries have begun to invest in the resource-rich country since it embarked on the democratic path.
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