A Myanmar appellate court on Friday upheld the convictions and seven-year prison sentences imposed on two Reuters journalists who had reported on abuses by Myanmar’s military against the Rohingya Muslim minority.

The journalists, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, uncovered a massacre of Rohingya in 2017, leading to a rare admission from the powerful military that its soldiers behaved improperly in a bloody campaign that sent some 700,000 refugees fleeing to neighboring Bangladesh.

They were arrested in December 2017, two months before their report was published, and were convicted in September for being in possession of state secrets. The case was condemned internationally, especially after a police officer serving as key prosecution witness said the men had been entrapped.

The journalists have become emblematic of increasing pressure against the news media by authoritarian regimes. The U.S. and other Western governments have called for the journalists’ release.

On Friday, the Yangon region high court rejected the journalists’ appeal and reaffirmed the convictions and sentences levied by the lower court. They have the option of making a final appeal to the supreme court, though it isn’t yet clear if they will.