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Wired News: DASSK - Wait before in



Subject: Wired News:  DASSK - Wait before investing

     By Deborah Charles
     RANGOON, Burma (Reuter) - Burma's opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi Wednesday
urged foreign businessmen to study the situation in Burma carefully before deciding whether
the time was right to invest in her resource-rich country
     "Of course, in the long run I think we would need international investment but I don't think we
should rush into this," she told the British Broadcasting Corp. in an interview.
     "It is the word rush I object to. I think you've got to study the situation much more carefully,"
she said.
     Burma's military government Monday revoked an order which has confined the
50-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner to the compound of her Rangoon home for the past
six years.
     Her release has been welcomed cautiously around the world by political leaders and the
business community, many members of which, particularly in neighboring Southeast Asian
countries, see attractive profits in long-isolated Burma's resources and its fledgling tourist
industry.
     "I want to study the situation much more carefully before I say whether I truly believed that
this is the right time for investments in Burma," Suu Kyi said.
     Exiled Burmese dissidents around the world have been lobbying for years against
investment in Burma, arguing that it would only bolster the position of the military government.
     Total foreign investment in Burma was $2.752 billion as of March this year, and was
expected to increase to $4 billion by the end of 1995, Burma's minister for national planning
and economic development, David Abel, said last month.
     Most foreign investment in Burma is in oil and gas, hotels and tourism, fisheries, mining
and forestry. The biggest investors include Britain, France, the United States, Singapore and
Thailand.
     Suu Kyi, daughter of Burma's revered independence hero Gen. Aung San, also appealed
Wednesday to her supporters to be patient but asssured them that democracy was on its
way.
     Standing on a chair behind her front gate and speaking through a megaphone, Suu Kyi
thanked about 200 supporters waiting outside, saying she was grateful for their support and
encouragement.
     The crowd cheered: "Long live Aung San Suu Kyi" several times after her brief impromptu
speech.
     The crowd, which grew steadily throughout the day, quietly dispersed after Suu Kyi's
speech when she urged them to leave and clear the road for traffic "as a good omen for our
cause."
     Earlier in the day, Suu Kyi held her second news conference since her release inside her
ramshackle lakeside home near Rangoon University.
     "I'd like to take this opportunity to warn everybody not to expect too much too quickly," she
said when asked if she was worried expectations had grown too high over her abilities to
restore democracy in Burma quickly.
     "I think there is still a long way ahead, and the way is not going to be all that smooth. But as
long as we have a will and as long as we go about it intelligently, I think we'll get there," she
added.
     She said she was meeting pro-democracy colleagues, and had not yet decided what her
next steps would be.
     For the second day since she was set free, Suu Kyi did not venture outside her house, and
by Wednesday night there had still been no official announcement of her release by the
ruling State Law and Order Restoration Council.
  REUTER