Story highlights Two journalists working for news agency have been detained, Myanmar government confirms

Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo were working on stories about Myanmar's Rohingya minority, agency says

(CNN) Two journalists working on stories about Rohingya in Myanmar for the news agency Reuters have been arrested and detained in the Southeast Asian country's largest city, Yangon.

The two reporters, named by the agency as Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, were arrested under the Official Secrets Act, a colonial-era law which carries a maximum 14-year jail sentence.

According to the US Embassy in Myanmar, the journalists were arrested Tuesday evening "after they were invited to meet with police officials."

The government acknowledged their arrest in a statement to the news agency, and also released a statement, along with a photo of the two men in handcuffs with their faces partially obscured on its Ministry of Information Facebook page.

The reporters "illegally acquired information with the intention to share it with foreign media," said the statement, according to Reuters. It added that they were held at a police station on the outskirts of Yangon. The two police officers who met the journalists were also arrested under the same statute, it said.

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