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Burma's Suu Kyi on 1st political tr (r)
- Subject: Burma's Suu Kyi on 1st political tr (r)
- From: moe@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 23 Oct 1997 14:36:00
Burma's Suu Kyi on 1st political trip since
release
03:34 a.m. Oct 23, 1997 Eastern
RANGOON, Oct 23 (Reuters) - Burmese opposition
leader Aung San Suu Kyi this week travelled
on her
first political trip outside the capital
since being released
from house arrest two years ago, opposition
sources
said on Thursday.
A division-level official of Suu Kyi's
National League
for Democracy (NLD) party said the 1991 Nobel
Peace laureate went to a town on the
outskirts of
Rangoon on Tuesday to organise the youth
NLD wing
and speak to supporters.
``Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, accompanied by NLD
Chairman U Tin Oo, central executive committee
member...U Soe Myint and some elected NLD
representatives, went to Thakata Township...on
Tuesday morning,'' a divisional level NLD
official told
Reuters.
He said Suu Kyi's trip went off without any
interference
from authorities. The NLD won a landslide
victory in a
1990 election but the military government
refused to
recognise the results.
Suu Kyi, who was officially released from
six years of
house arrest in July 1995, has been under tight
surveillance since last December. Her
visitors are
limited, her telephone is cut and her movements
restricted.
She made several aborted attempts,
including a widely
publicised train trip to Mandalay, to leave
Rangoon on
political business after being released
from house arrest.
The trip to Mandalay was abandoned after
the train
broke down.
She was advised by officials not to travel
outside her
lakeside home -- which has become the party's
headquarters over the past two years -- for
party work.
The government has severely limited
activities by the
NLD, stopping several large party
congresses, by
arresting thousands of NLD officials over
the past few
years.
Suu Kyi says the government has also
prevented local
party offices across the country from doing
their work
by pressuring NLD officials and threatening
them with
arrest.
Authorities put up barricades blocking
access to Suu
Kyi's house and the road leading to it in
late 1996. This
put an end to popular weekend gatherings
outside Suu
Kyi's home which drew up to 10,000 people who
gathered to hear Suu Kyi and other top NLD
officials
speak.
Local analysts said Suu Kyi's visit to
Thakata could be
a sign of improved relations between the
ruling State
Law and Order Restoration Council (SLORC)
and the
NLD.
``We can say there is still hope for
understanding to
grow between the NLD and the SLORC,'' one
analyst
said. ``Maybe this is a sign of relaxation
of the
SLORC's control over the NLD.''
He noted that the SLORC allowed the NLD to
hold a
large party gathering at Suu Kyi's house in
late
September to mark the party's ninth
anniversary. The
meeting the previous year had been stymied
by the
government. ^MORE@