Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
practising piano, and listening to news on the radio. From May 1992 until January 1995
she was also permitted regular visits from her husband and sons.
Five Years of Freedom
Much to the joy of her supporters at home and abroad, as well as her family, the govern-
ment released Suu Kyi from house arrest in July 1995. She was allowed to travel outside
Yangon with permission, which was rarely granted. During her subsequent five years of
freedom, she would test the authorities several times with varying degrees of success.
The last time she would see her husband was in January 1996. A year later he was dia-
gnosed with prostate cancer, which would prove to be terminal. Despite appeals from the
likes of Pope John Paul II and UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, the generals refused to
allow Aris a visa to visit his wife, saying that Suu Kyi was free to leave the country to
tend to him. Aris died in an Oxford hospital on 27 March 1999, his 53rd birthday; over
the telephone he had insisted Suu Kyi remain in Burma where many political prisoners
and their families also relied on her support.
The following decade was marked by more extended periods of house arrest punctu-
ated by shorter spells of freedom. A couple of intercessions by UN special envoys resul-
ted in talks with military leaders and the release of hundreds of political prisoners, but no
real progress on the political front - nor release for the woman who had become the
world's most famous prisoner of conscience.
Run-Up to Elections & Release
On 22 September 2007, at the height of the failed 'Saffron Revolution', the barricades
briefly came down along University Ave, allowing the protestors to pass Aung San Suu
Kyi's house. In a powerful scene, later recounted by eyewitnesses and captured on
mobile-phone footage, the jailed NLD leader was briefly glimpsed at the gate of her
compound, tears in her eyes, silently accepting the blessing of the monks.
A couple of meetings with a UN envoy, Ibrahim Gambari, and members of the milit-
ary later that year failed to result in Suu Kyi's release. Her house arrest was extended by
a year in 2008 and then by a further 18 months in August 2009 following her encounter
with John Yettaw (see Click here ) .
Six days after the 2010 election, the regime finally saw fit to release her, announcing
in the New Light of Myanmar that she had been pardoned for 'good conduct'. Ten days
later she was reunited with her son Kim, who brought her a puppy as a present. Kim re-
turned again in July of 2011 to accompany his mother on a trip to Bagan, her first outside
of Yangon since 2003.
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