Suu Kyi prayer vigil disrupted in Myanmar

YANGON, May 27 (Reuters) Government supporters and police blocked a prayer march by supporters of Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi today, two days after the ruling military extended her house arrest for another year.

More than 300 protesters, led by former student leaders of a 1988 pro-democracy uprising crushed by the regime, had planned to hold prayers at Shwedagon Pagoda in the commercial capital Yangon.

But supporters of the military government and plainclothes police barricaded the road as the marchers neared the pagoda, which has been the scene of previous prayer vigils for Suu Kyi.

The brief standoff ended without incident as the marchers, most of them members of Suu Kyi's opposition National League for Democracy (NLD), returned to party headquarters where they prayed and shouted slogans such as ''free Aung San Suu Kyi'' and ''release her now''.

''They can't stop us from praying. We will let them know they can't stop us,'' Min Ko Naing, a 1988 student leader who was jailed for nearly 16 years, told the crowd, many of whom wore t-shirts bearing Suu Kyi's image.

Suu Kyi, 61, has been in detention for more than 11 of the last 17 years. United Nations special rapporteur for human rights in Myanmar, Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, has called her confinement ''cruel and unacceptable''.

Official media said yesterday Suu Kyi's latest confinement, which began on May 30, 2003, was lenient and her release was not necessary for national reconciliation.

Today's protest marked the anniversary of the NLD's sweeping 1990 election victory, which was overruled by the military that has controlled former Burma in various guises since 1962.

The rally, which was observed by police, ended peacefully.

''It is a victory for the people who love and desire justice and democracy. They peacefully showed how united and disciplined they are,'' Ko Ko Gyi, another former 1988 student leader, told reporters.

REUTERS SLD RK2118