Burma’s military government has freed the 82-year-old deputy leader of the pro-democracy party led by Aung San Suu Kyi after nearly seven years in detention.

The UN special envoy to promote political reconciliation in Burma met Aung San Suu Kyi and other opposition party members today, a day after being rebuffed by the country’s military rulers.

Burma authorities claimed they seized weapons from Buddhist monasteries and announced dozens of new arrests, defying world outrage over their violent repression of protesters who sought an end to 45 years of dictatorship.

YOUR report headlined ‘World protests at continued arrest of Aung San Suu Kyi’ (Irish Examiner, June 20) brings into focus the fact that the plight of Burma’s democratically elected leader remains the same now as it has been since 1996.

BURMA’S secretive military regime has sacked its prime minister, seen as a relative pragmatist, and replaced him with a general who has taken a hard line in dealing with the country’s pro-democracy movement.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations has urged Myanmar’s military government to free pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, a rare intrusion into the internal affairs of one of its members.

A United Nations envoy to Burma met detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi today and said she was “well and in good spirits”.

The Burmese military government brought detained pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi to the capital Yangon today after it also closed the offices of her party, held key supporters and ordered universities shut across Myanmar.