Burma regime hits back at critics
Trial of Suu Kyi not about human rights, it says
RANGOON, Burma - Burma's military regime lashed out at foreign critics of Aung San Suu Kyi's trial yesterday, accusing them of meddling in the country's affairs and denying that the prosecution of the opposition leader is a political or human-rights issue.
Deputy Foreign Minister Maung Myint rebuked his counterparts from Southeast Asia and Europe at a meeting in Cambodia, saying the trial that could jail Suu Kyi, 63, for up to five years is an "internal legal" issue.
"It's not political. It's not a human-rights issue, so we don't accept the pressure and interference from abroad," Maung Myint told ministers at the Phnom Penh meeting.
It was the government's strongest reaction yet to international outrage at Suu Kyi's trial on charges that she violated her house arrest by harboring an uninvited American in early May.
The Nobel peace laureate denies the charges, which critics say are aimed at keeping her in detention until after an election next year that they say will entrench the generals' power, after nearly a half-century of military rule.
The trial was adjourned to Monday after the court heard from lawyer Kyi Win, Suu Kyi's only defense witness after three others were rejected by the judge. No reason was given for the rejection of the others.
Activists said it was the latest attempt by the regime to sabotage Suu Kyi's defense since the trial began nine days ago.
Nyan Win, one of Suu Kyi's lawyers, said the court agreed to allow them to meet her privately tomorrow to discuss her defense. Final arguments are due Monday.
"If everything goes according to the law, we must win," he said after yesterday's closed session inside Insein prison.
No date for a verdict was set, but a conviction is widely expected. In Burma, renamed Myanmar by the junta, the courts routinely interpret the law to suit the generals.
Suu Kyi's supporters have quietly gathered each day near the prison, which is ringed by armed police and barbed-wire barricades. There have been no major protests so far, but police arrested a lone protester at a market near the prison yesterday.
Zaw Nyunt, a 56-year-old retired air force officer, held up a poster with the words "Saving Suu is Saving Burma," in English and Burmese. He was quickly packed off by plainclothes police, witnesses said.
Suu Kyi has spent much of the last two decades in some form of detention, mostly at her lakeside home under police guard, her phone line cut and visitors restricted. Burma's generals, the latest in an unbroken line of military rulers since 1962, have ignored the international outcry.
In Phnom Penh, European and Southeast Asian ministers issued a final communique calling for the release of all political prisoners and said all political parties should be allowed to join next year's elections "in a free and fair manner." The American intruder, John Yettaw, of Missouri, whose swim to Suu Kyi's home on May 4 triggered the trial, told the court on Wednesday he had a "vision" that Suu Kyi was assassinated by "terrorists" and had wanted to warn her.
