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AFP : Aung San Suu Kyi's son arrive
- Subject: AFP : Aung San Suu Kyi's son arrive
- From: euburma@xxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1999 20:55:00
Subject: AFP : Aung San Suu Kyi's son arrives in Myanmar
YANGON, April 16 (AFP) - Aung San Suu Kyi's younger son arrived in Myanmar
on Friday on the first visit by a member of her family since her British
husband died from cancer last month, officials said.
The democracy leader met Kim Htein Lin Aris, 21, at Yangon airport after
he
flew in on a Thai Airways flight from Bangkok, a government statement said.
Michael Aris, Aung San Suu Kyi's husband of 27 years, died on his 53rd
birthday in Britain on March 27 after the government denied his request to
pay
a final visit to his wife in Myanmar.
Diplomats in Yangon said plans for Kim Aris' visit had been kept as
low-key
as possible to avoid political complications. There was no indication if her
elder son Alexander, 25, would also visit soon.
Both of Aung San Suu Kyi's sons have been stripped of their passports by
the military junta and would have been travelling on British documents,
diplomats said.
Myanmar officials have previously said that as Aung San Suu Kyi's sons are
not involved in politics they have had no problem in obtaining visas.
Michael Aris, however was accused of meddling in Myanmar's internal
affairs
during his infrequent visits to the country.
Aung San Suu Kyi is locked in a political battle with the government which
lost 1990 elections to her National League for Democracy but has refused to
hand over power.
She turned down a junta offer to let her travel to Britain to see her
dying
husband, fearing she would not be allowed to return.
Myanmar justified its failure to grant Aris a visa by saying its medical
facilities were too primitive to treat him.
It also accused her of manipulating her husband's illness for political
gain. The junta suggested that she should have gone to visit Aris in England
as she was in good health.
In an interview published in a British newspaper this month, Aung San Suu
Kyi said her sons had asked her to travel to Britain to see Aris before he
died.
"Imagine how hard it was to say no to them," she was quoted as saying.
Accusing the junta of "political blackmail", she said, "After all, their
greatest wish was to see me leave."
"They were desperate to get me out of the country and they thought my
husband's illness gave them the perfect opportunity."
Aung San Suu Kyi rarely alludes to personal matters in interviews, saying
that many people suffer far greater personal anguish than she does in a
country accused by foreign governments and rights groups of a catalogue of
human rights abuses.
Although no longer under house arrest her movements are strictly
controlled
by the government. It has been accused by diplomats of conducting a campaign
of arrests designed to crush her party.
Aris, an Oxford academic and a distinguished Tibetan scholar, made his
last
visit to see his wife in 1996. Several subsequent visa requests are thought
to
have been rejected.
Her sons have been more frequent visitors to the country where Aung San
Suu
Kyi returned in 1988 and soon emerged at the head of the pro-democracy
movement.
Aris was cremated at a ceremony attended by only close family and friends
in England earlier this month. Aung San Suu Kyi held funeral rites for him at
her home in Yangon.
After his death, Aung San Suu Kyi said she had been privileged to have had
a "wonderful" husband who had always given her understanding.
She met Aris in London in the early 1970s.
Thida (Thin Myat Thu) http://www.communique.no/dvb/
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Democratic Voice of Burma Fax: +47 22 41 39 29
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