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| Southeast Asia | |
| Junta extends Suu Kyis confinement | |
| 2009-08-12 | |
| [Bangla Daily Star] Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi was yesterday handed another 18 months of house arrest, taking the Nobel laureate out of the picture for elections next year and sparking international outrage. A court convicted the 64-year-old at the end of a marathon trial for breaching the terms of her detention by the ruling military junta, following a bizarre incident in which an American man swam uninvited to her home. Judges sentenced Suu Kyi to three years of hard labour and imprisonment, but military ruler Than Shwe signed a special order commuting the sentence and ordering her to serve out a year-and-a-half under house arrest. World leaders rounded on the regime after the verdict, with the European Union threatening fresh sanctions and top US diplomat Hillary Clinton condemning the trial and demanding the release of US national John Yettaw. Suu Kyi looked alert but tired during the 90-minute court session. After the verdict was announced, she stood and thanked foreign diplomats for attending her trial. "I hope we can all work for peace and prosperity of the country," Suu Kyi said in a soft voice to diplomats seated nearby. She then was led out of the courtroom. "Thank you for the verdict," a grim-faced Suu Kyi, wearing pink and light grey traditional Burmese dress, said after the court at Yangon's notorious Insein Prison announced the judgement. The 64-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate has already been in detention for 14 of the last 20 years, mostly under house arrest, and the extension will remove her from the political scene while the country holds junta-organised elections next year. The American, John Yettaw, 54, the epileptic former US military veteran who swam to her lakeside house in May, was sentenced to seven years of hard labour and imprisonment on three charges.
Suu Kyi was later driven back to the house under tight security and the road outside the crumbling villa was sealed off, Myanmar officials said. Home Affairs Minister Maung Oo had made a surprise entrance to the courtroom just minutes after the judgment was read out to announce Than Shwe's intervention in the case. He said her time in house arrest could be shortened "if she lives well in the suspended sentence", saying that the move was "also for the peaceful security of the country and also to move towards democratisation". | |
| Posted by:Fred |