Myanmar junta too scared to free Suu Kyi

Mae Sot, Thailand, May 24: A rare spate of protests in Myanmar means the junta is very unlikely to release democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi when her latest year of house arrest expires this weekend, former political prisoners say.

In what is becoming an annual ritual in the run-up to Sunday's deadline, the White House, European Union, United Nations and fellow Nobel peace prize laureates have issued urgent appeals to the generals running the former Burma to set her free.

But the pleas for the release of the 61-year-old woman, who has been behind bars or under house arrest since mid-2003, are even more likely than usual to fall on deaf ears.

Two exiled dissidents said a prayer campaign for Suu Kyi last year and protests this year against deteriorating living conditions in the main city, Yangon, had sent shivers through the junta top brass - even though the demonstrations have been tiny.

''They are scared of her, especially at the moment,'' said 54-year-old activist Khun Saing, who spent 13 years behind bars before fleeing to the Thai border town of Mae Sot in 2006.

The last time Suu Kyi was released from house arrest, in 2002, she drew huge crowds on a tour of the country, a reminder to the generals of the huge sway the daughter of independence hero Aung San still held over Myanmar's 54 million people.

''In 2002, the regime thought they could control the people not to support her. They were shocked by the level of support - people came out to greet her in great numbers,'' Khun Naing said.

''Sacrifice''

Suu Kyi, who has now been in detention for more than 11 of the last 17 years, is being held under an obscure security decree that has to be renewed every 12 months, giving her supporters annual cause for optimism.

Quite why the junta, which ignored her party's massive election victory in 1990, makes such a show of observing the rule of law in keeping her in isolation, without a telephone and requiring military permission to receive visitors, is a mystery.

''They just make the laws for their own convenience,'' said Khun Saing, standing beside a wall of black-and-white photographs of Myanmar's estimated 1,100 political prisoners in the offices of the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners in Mae Sot.

Near an image of Suu Kyi is journalist Win Tin, now 77, Myanmar's longest-serving prisoner of conscience.

He was jailed for 20 years in 1989 for offences including subversion and anti-government propaganda -- writing a critical human rights report and sending it to the United Nations.

While there has been no progress under a junta ''roadmap to democracy'' unveiled in 2003, former prisoner Bo Gyi, 42, said the recent protests could be signs of a stirring public conscience.

''The people are doing something for their rights. We are seeing complaints about living conditions,'' he said, taking a long drag from a dark green cheroot.

The army crushed the last mass uprising against military rule ruthlessly in 1988. Hundreds, if not thousands, were killed as troops machine-gunned students in Yangon and elsewhere.

Those leading the current campaigns, many of them members of the ''88'' uprising, were well aware of the risks, Bo Gyi said.

''Any struggle without sacrifice cannot succeed. They are sacrificing their lives for the future generation,'' he said.

Reuters>