NLD says Suu Kyi a junta "hostage"

Myanmar opposition says Suu Kyi a junta "hostage"

December 10 (Reuters) - Myanmar's main opposition party will never attend a constitution-forming National Convention while its iconic leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, remains a "hostage" of the ruling junta, a top party official said on Friday.

U Lwin, the National League for Democracy's (NLD) octogenarian spokesman, said Nobel laureate Suu Kyi was being kept out of the way with a lengthy term of house arrest because of fears she would disrupt the convention's progress.

"They allow us to discuss but still they are holding her," he told Reuters in an interview at the NLD's dilapidated headquarters in Myanmar's leafy capital, Yangon.

The headquarters -- covered in murals and photographs of Suu Kyi -- was only allowed to reopen last year shortly before the start of the convention.

"It is something like taking her as a hostage while we are attending the convention," U Lwin said, sitting in front of a gold Soviet-style bust of Suu Kyi, Myanmar's spiritual democracy leader who has spent much of the last 15 years under arrest.

The military, which has run the former Burma in various guises since 1962, has embarked on a seven-step "roadmap to democracy", with a National Convention to draw up a new constitution as its first step.

Europe and the United States have dismissed the plan as a sham, especially while Suu Kyi, who won a landslide election victory in 1990 only to be denied power by the military, remains under lock and key in her lakeside Yangon home.

U Lwin said the opposition had no idea when she or her deputy, Tin Oo, would be freed.

"We don't insist that she must be present at the National Convention. We don't ask that. We only want her and Tin Oo to be released," U Lwin said.

NO RELEASE DATE

Despite diplomatic pressure from its southeast Asian neighbours and sanctions from Europe and the U.S., the junta has refused to budge,
even deciding last month to extend her detention by another year, according to diplomats and the NLD.

U Lwin said her time in detention had been extended to allow the junta To draw up a constitution with Myanmar's myriad ethnic groups behind Suu Kyi's back.

"I don't know how long they will take to complete this so-called National Convention," U Lwin said.

"At the first stage, it was not very promising. That is why they cannot take any chances and they had to extend for another year, so they can cover the National Convention without her disturbing it. They are very much worried about her," he said.

The NLD is prepared to talk to the military government, U Lwin said, But he gave only the vaguest notion of an agenda.

"At this moment the country is suffering from a general and very serious crisis, not only political but also economic and social. We will start with this - how to overcome the crisis we are facing today. No details - just like that.

"We are going to talk about the future of our country. Basically we must build democracy here, just democracy," he said.

Despite being jailed for much of the last 15 years, U Lwin said Suu Kyi, who is visited three times per week by a doctor, remained in good Health apart from recently requiring extensive dental treatment.

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