A court in Myanmar has charged two jailed Reuters reporters with obtaining state secrets on Monday (July 9).

The ruling moves the landmark press freedom case to its trial stage after six months of preliminary hearings.

A Yangon district court charged reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo with breaching the colonial-era Official Secrets Act.

Both have pled not guilty to the charges.

The case has garnered worldwide attention.

Some diplomats and rights groups say it is a major test of press freedoms under the administration of Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

Myanmar's military still wields huge influence in the country.

Earlier this month, defense lawyers asked the judge to throw out the case, arguing the prosecution had failed to provide sufficient evidence to support the charges.

The reporters' defense lawyers say the journalists were arrested in a sting operation aimed at interfering with their reporting.

At the same July 2nd hearing, prosecutor Kyaw Min Aung urged the judge to charge the reporters.

He said documents they had in their hands when they were arrested detailed the movements of security forces, while further documents found on their mobile phones ranged from confidential to top secret.

At the time of their arrest in December, the reporters had been investigating the killing of 10 Rohingya Muslim men in a village in Myanmar's Rakhine state.

The killings took place during a military crackdown that the U.N. says led to more than 700,000 Rohingya fleeing to neighboring Bangladesh.

In a statement after Monday's ruling, Reuters President and editor-in-chief Stephen Adler said quote: "We are deeply disappointed that the court declined to end this protracted and baseless proceeding against Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo.

These Reuters journalists were doing their jobs in an independent and impartial way, and there are no facts or evidence to suggest that they've done anything wrong or broken any law." Myanmar's government has declined to comment throughout the proceedings saying only that Myanmar's courts are independent, and the case would be conducted according to law.