Reuters-ANALYSIS-Myanmar's Suu Kyi

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Subject: Reuters-ANALYSIS-Myanmar's Suu Kyi has no faith in offer 

ANALYSIS-Myanmar's Suu Kyi has no faith in offer
09:28 a.m. Mar 26, 1999 Eastern
By Rajan Moses

BANGKOK, March 26 (Reuters) - Myanmar's offer on Friday to allow opposition
leader Aung San Suu Kyi to visit her dying husband in Britain is likely a
ploy to get her out of the country for good, political analysts said.

Myanmar's military government said she could return home after seeing her
husband, but that the offer was conditional on her not making any political
comment while she was away.

Suu Kyi was not available for comment on the offer, but the government said
she had flatly refused it.

Analysts do not doubt that she has, citing her deep mistrust of the
country's ruling generals.

``This is Suu Kyi. If she were to go to England, all the press and
politicians would come to see her and she would inevitably say something
political,'' said Myanmar scholar and journalist Bertil Lintner.

``Then the military could turn around and say she has broken her side of the
bargain and bar her from entering Myanmar again. That would finish her whole
political cause,'' he told Reuters.

Suu Kyi's British husband, academic Michael Aris, 52, is dying of cancer and
recently applied for a visa to travel to Myanmar for what would likely be
the couple's last reunion.

Myanmar said Suu Kyi should go to him instead.

A Myanmar expert who belongs to a regional human rights group said the
military had a poor record of honouring its promises.

``This is the same regime that guaranteed that the outcome of the 1990
general election in Burma (Myanmar) would be honoured and they did not,''
said an analyst with a rights group.

The military refused to recognise the results of the 1990 polls which Suu
Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) party swept. Suu Kyi and the
generals have been bitter foes ever since.

The expert, who declined to be identified, said Suu Kyi also probably feared
that she could expose core members of her NLD to military manipulation or
repression if she left the country.

``They could clean up the party in her absence. If she was around she could
make loud noises to keep them at bay from the key party officials,'' the
expert said.

But other analysts and diplomats said that the ruling State Peace and
Development Council had to some extent come out smelling like a rose by

making the offer to Suu Kyi.

``On the face of it, it makes the military look good. But if you look deeper
into it there could be a trick... that if she makes any statement it is held
against her and she cannot come back,'' said Lintner.

The Myanmar expert with the human rights group said: ``Don't forget, the
original request was for Aris to get a visa to come to Myanmar, not for her
to go to Britain.''

Analysts said the military viewed the situation as an ideal pretext to rid
itself of Suu Kyi, a thorn in its side for a decade -- and appear
compassionate in doing so.

``The ball has been placed in Suu Kyi's court now. That was a smart move by
the military,'' said one diplomat.

A Yangon analyst said: ``Nobody should take political advantage of this
situation. They both need to show humanitarianism toward the dying person.''

``Both parties should keep their promises. Suu Kyi should agree to the
condition offered by the government if she is sincere,'' said the Yangon
analyst who declined to be named.

Suu Kyi said this week her party faced its worst repression in years from
the military. The action against her party has been stepped up since she
recently called for the convening of a ``Peoples Parliament'' of MPs elected
in the 1990 polls.

She says some 150 NLD members elected in 1990 were under detention to
prevent them from convening the parliament.