LONDON, June 14: Almost a quarter of a century since she last set foot in Europe, the Burmese pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi kicked off a five-country tour in Switzerland on Thursday, welcoming the international community's efforts to strengthen reform in her homeland.
The 66-year-old former political prisoner, kept under house arrest for 15 of the last 22 years, was addressing the International Labour Organisation (ILO) in Geneva, her first engagement in a whirlwind tour certain to elevate further her status as international political celebrity.
Now a member of parliament in Myanmar, the Nobel peace prize laureate welcomed steps to reach out to her country, which has long been isolated because of its military dictatorship.
Wearing trademark flowers in her hair, “The Lady” as she is known, was given a rapturous welcome by the ILO, an organisation she chose to address because of its long campaign against child and slave labour in Myanmar. “The international community is trying very hard to bring my country into it, and it’s up to our country to respond the right way,” she said.
“Any new investment that comes in because of the lifting or suspension of sanctions should add to the democratic process rather than subtract from it,” she later told reporters.
The tour, which also takes in Norway, Ireland, Britain and ends in France, will be the first opportunity for western leaders to analyse Aung San Suu Kyi's transition from a prisoner of conscience during years of detention to stateswoman.
The red carpet is being rolled out during the 17-day visit, seen as another milestone in Myanmar's political progress, where President Thein Sein's recent reforms have led to a lifting of sanctions.
Especially emotional for the mother of two will be a return to her “beloved” Oxford, where she studied and later settled with her husband, the academic and Tibetan expert Dr Michael Aris, who died from cancer in 1999 having been refused a visa to visit the wife he had been able to see only five times in the previous 10 years. The couple raised their sons, Alexander, 38, and Kim, 34, in the city and she is due to receive an honorary degree at a ceremony at Oxford University on 20 June.
Another auspicious engagement will be when Aung San Suu Kyi addresses both houses of parliament in Westminster Hall, London, on June 21, an honour that has been accorded, in recent times, to Nelson Mandela in 1996, Barack Obama in 2011, Pope Benedict XVI in 2010, and Queen Elizabeth II. It has never before been bestowed on the leader of an opposition party.
Ireland will host an Electric Myanmar concert on June 18, during which U2 frontman Bono will present her with the Ambassador of Conscience award, Amnesty International’s most prestigious honour.
The show will feature Irish staples including Sir Bob Geldof and the Riverdance troupe. “To be allowed to honour this woman is an honour in itself. The heroine of dignity, integrity, courage and steely moral vigour lost her freedom and her family in order to gain a nation. Ireland is ennobled by her visit,” Geldof said.
Bono has, reportedly, lent Aung San Suu Kyi his private jet to fly her to Ireland from Oslo, where she will finally give her acceptance speech on Saturday, 21 years after being awarded the Nobel peace prize and lauded as “an extraordinary example of civil courage” and “important symbol in the struggle against oppression”.
It was accepted by her son, Alexander, then 18, who received a standing ovation when he said Aung San Suu Kyi had accepted it “in the name of all the people of Myanmar”.
His voice trembled as he spoke of his wish that soon she would be able to “speak directly for herself, instead of through me”.
More than two decades later, that moment is poised to be one of the tour's highlights.
By arrangement with the Guardian