IN HER first speech in 24 years to an international audience, Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi yesterday urged caution when dealing with Burma, despite the reform process.
Ms Suu Kyi, who will visit Dublin later this month, received a standing ovation at the World Economic Forum in Bangkok. She said her mission was to discuss how the world can help “that little piece of the world that some of us call Burma and some of us call Myanmar”.
Her first trip outside the country in quarter of a century came amid signs of opening up in Burma following reforms introduced by president Thein Sein, a general in the former military junta, which took power in a 1962 coup in the former British colony.
He has freed hundreds of political prisoners, relaxed censorship, permitted trade unions, spoken to ethnic rebels in the border region and allowed Ms Suu Kyi’s National League of Democracy (NLD) to re-register as a political party.
“These days I am coming across what I call reckless optimism,” she said, adding: “A little bit of healthy scepticism I think is in order.”
Ms Suu Kyi spent 15 years under house arrest and even during her periods of freedom never dared leave her homeland as she knew the junta would not let her back in. This included not venturing abroad to visit her dying husband.
After numerous setbacks and years of abuse by the junta, she has learned this “healthy scepticism” herself. She said she believed Mr Sein was sincere in his commitment to reform. “But I also recognise that he’s not the only person in government. And, as I keep repeating, there’s the military to be reckoned with.”
The 66-year-old became a member of parliament after a historic landslide win by the NLD in a byelection in April.
She said Burma lacked the basic education and training needed to help nurture political reform and create the jobs required to end high unemployment in the impoverished country.
“I’m extremely worried about youth unemployment,” she said, describing it as “a timebomb”.
One thing that struck her, she said, was the difference in development between Burma and neighbouring Thailand, the country with which Burmese most often compare themselves. During decades of military rule and economic sanctions by the West, Burma fell far behind it in development.
Sanctions are expected to be rowed back as Burma reforms, and this should translate into aid and investment in Burma’s infrastructure. Ms Suu Kyi said she hoped foreign firms would be cautious in how they invested, to make sure the poor also benefit.
Ms Suu Kyi is due to return to Burma before heading to Europe for a five-country tour in the middle of this month.
She will address the British parliament, accept her Nobel prize in Oslo and attend the Electric Burma concert in Dublin on June 18th, at which U2 singer Bono will present her with Amnesty International’s ambassador of conscience award.
