Phnom Penh, June 15: Myanmar's Foreign Minister said today that the country's military government will not commit itself to a date for releasing pro-democracy leader Aung San
Suu Kyi.
But the government definitely wants to free her when the
time comes, Foreign Minister Win Aung told reporters in Phnom
Penh where he will attend an annual association of South East
Asian nations conference beginning tomorrow.
Suu Kyi was detained on May 30 after a clash between her
supporters and a pro-government mob in northern Myanmar. She
has been kept incommunicado since then, jeopardizing the
reconciliation process to end the country's 15-year-old
political deadlock.
"Don't press us to commit ourselves to a timeframe and
date of releasing her. We do not tie ourselves with that
commitment, but the important thing is that the will (to free
her) is there," he said.
Myanmar's government has said in the past that Suu Kyi a
Nobel peace laureate, will be freed when the situation becomes
normal, and that she is being kept in detention for her own
safety.
The current Junta came to power in 1988 after crushing a
pro-democracy movement. It called elections in 1990 but
refused to hand over power after Suu Kyi's National League for
Democracy party won.
She was kept for several years under house arrest, and
a UN-mediated national reconciliation process started in
October 2000 has made little progress.
Bureau Report
