Release Suu Kyi, Obama tells Burmese PM
Barack Obama raises detention of Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi "directly" with country's prime minister
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By Darren Estwick. |  |
Sunday, 15, Nov 2009 12:46
By Matthew Champion
Barack Obama raised the detention of Burmese democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi "directly" with the country's leaders during a visit to Asia, the White House has said.
The US president was in Singapore attending a meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) when he urged Burma's prime minister General Thein Sein to release the 64-year-old.
Photos from the summit showed the leaders of the ten Asean members, including Burma, standing in a line with President Obama.
But it is unclear whether his comments amount to highly-significant direct talks between the US president and the junta ruling Burma.
It is not thought that President Obama shook hands with Gen Sein at any point.
"The president was just - as you know - in the scheduled meeting with the ten Asean nations, and brought up in the meeting the... release of Aung San Suu Kyi by Burma," said White House press secretary Robert Gibbs.
"So, he brought that up directly with that government."
Despite the claim from the White House, however, an official statement released following Asean-US talks failed to mentioned Daw Suu Kyi by name.
Since 1990 the 64-year-old has spent just five years out of detention, whether in prison or under house arrest.
Daw Suu Kyi was given a further 18 months house arrest in August when a trial dismissed as politically motivated by international observers found her guilty over an American man's unsolicited night-time swim to her dilapidated Rangoon residence.
The National League for Democracy (NLD) leader's party won a landslide election victory at the turn of the last decade, but since then the ruling junta has entrenched its power by hiding Daw Suu Kyi from the public eye.
She is one of 2,100 political prisoners still behind bars in Burma, UK campaigners claim.