Aung San Suu Kyi, Beyond Myanmar’s Borders

Links View From Asia |By DIDI KIRSTEN TATLOW| May 30, 2012, 1:12 am

The last time Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of Myanmar’s democracy movement, traveled internationally, it was 1988 and the Berlin Wall was still standing. That year, she flew back to Myanmar from Britain to care for her ailing mother.
Today, the lawmaker and leader of Myanmar’s opposition is in Thailand on a historic – and politically sensitive – trip, the first outside her country in nearly a quarter of a century. As The Irrawaddy, a Thailand-based news magazine set up by exiles from Myanmar, put it, “Only now does Aung San Suu Kyi really seem to feel free.”
To get a sense of the historic nature of this trip (and just how long it’s been since the Nobel Peace laureate was last about in the world), consider these facts, from a story by The Associated Press: In 1988, Ronald Reagan was still president of the United States, Libyan terrorists blew up Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, and Prozac was introduced to the market.
In June, Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi will visit Switzerland, Britain and Ireland, where she is due to appear on stage at a concert by Bono, who has been an outspoken supporter. She will also travel to Oslo for her Nobel, awarded in 1991 but never received by her.
Most significantly, her presence in Thailand signals that the woman who cared so passionately about bringing democracy to Myanmar that she endured many years of house arrest, even missing the funeral of her husband in Britain, is confident that the government of President Thein Sein is serious about the democratic reforms it began last year. Until now, though she could probably have traveled at times, she stayed behind, fearful that the generals who ran Myanmar wouldn’t let her back in.
The trip “signifies a strong vote of confidence on Suu Kyi’s part in the seriousness of the reforms underway in the country,” Suzanne DiMaggio, the Asia Society’s vice president of global policy programs, told The Huffington Post. She wouldn’t take the risk of leaving “if she wasn’t absolutely certain she would be allowed to return,” Ms. DiMaggio said. ........