Burma Won't Create a Democratic Constitution, U.S. Govt Says

April 1 (Bloomberg) - Burma's national convention won't create a democratic constitution because opposition and ethnic minority parties aren't included in the discussions, the U.S. State Department said.

"Given these deep flaws, any constitution that emerges from the national convention would not constitute meaningful steps toward the establishment of democracy,'' the State Department said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday from Washington.

The convention is being adjourned "until the end of this year," said Lieutenant General Thein Sein, the head of the meeting, according to a report today on the Web site of the official New Light of Myanmar newspaper. Thein Sein didn't give a date for the resumption of talks.

Myanmar 's military junta, which has ruled the country also known as Burma for 42 years, revealed a plan in 2003 to introduce political changes beginning with the drafting of a new constitution. The opposition National League for Democracy is boycotting the convention because its leaders Aung San Suu Kyi and Tin Oo remain under house arrest.

"The national convention does not reflect the true political aspirations of the Burmese people,'' the State Department said in its statement. "Nor does it serve as a real forum for the meaningful dialogue that is needed to achieve genuine national reconciliation.''

The meeting has successfully laid down detailed basic principles for the distribution of power in defense, foreign affairs, the economy, industry and agriculture, the official English-language newspaper cited Thein Sein as saying before the convention adjourned yesterday.

More than 1,000 delegates attended the convention's second session that began on Feb. 17. The meeting held its first session in May last year.

House Arrest

The military last year extended house arrest restrictions on Suu Kyi, 59, that have been enforced since May 2003. Suu Kyi won the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize for her nonviolent struggle for democracy in Myanmar.

Myanmar has been under international sanctions since the junta rejected the results of elections in 1990 won by the National League for Democracy.