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Activist defends party
South China Morning Post
Tuesday September 9 1997
Burma
Activist defends party...................................................
ASSOCIATED PRESS in Bangkok
Democracy advocate Aung San Suu Kyi says her political party is neither dead
nor dormant despite increased arrests and repression by the military
government.
She also believes her movement has substantial support within Burma's armed
forces.
Ms Aung San Suu Kyi made the comments in a rare videotaped interview smuggled
out of Burma and seen in Bangkok yesterday. The regime no longer allows
journalists to meet the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner and has severely
restricted her movements as it has steadily stepped up repression against her
party since last October.
Ms Aung San Suu Kyi said arrests of her party's members, and forced
resignation of its MPs, were proof it was still active despite attempts to
crush it.
"We are not a dormant party. That is why we are being harassed by the junta.
If we were dead and done for, it would not bother to arrest anybody," she
said.
"They know we are a powerful force within the country, which is why they have
placed so many restrictions on us."
She held out hope that a compromise eventually would be worked out with the
junta, and noted that during the 1990 elections, her party, the National
League for Democracy (NLD), had scored victories in districts heavily
populated by army personnel.
"I believe we have strong support within the Army," she said.
Junta leaders ignored the election results.
Ms Aung San Suu Kyi played down a meeting last month between General Khin
Nyunt, the head of military intelligence, and her party's chairman, Aung Shwe,
that some interpreted as a prelude to dialogue between the NLD and the
military. It was the first meeting between a junta general and her party's
officials in years.
"At best we could think of it as a sounding out to see whether dialogue is
possible," she said.
"At worst it could be aimed at trying to create a split in the party."
The democracy leader also discounted any possibility that the military could
exclude her from talks.
"According to the mandate of the NLD, any dialogue between the NLD and the
junta must include me," she said, adding that her democratic movement was
gaining from Burma's deteriorating economy - its currency has lost more than
90 per cent of its value in the past year and inflation is running at more
than 40 per cent - and the regime's newspaper attacks on her.