Yangon: Democracy campaigner Aung San Suu Kyi on Tuesday attended a memorial for her father, Myanmar’s independence hero General Aung San, for the first time in nine years amid tight security.
The 66-year-old, who was released from house arrest after controversial elections last November, laid baskets of yellow and red roses at the Martyrs’ Day ceremony in the capital Yangon.
A heavy police presence surrounded the remembrance day memorial, which marks the assassination of her father and several other independence leaders on July 19, 1947.
Suu Kyi attended the ceremony, led by Yangon’s mayor and attended by government officials and soldiers, for the first time since 2002, the year before her latest stint under house arrest began. Wearing a traditional black longyi (a wrapped skirt) and white blouse, the Nobel Peace Prize winner appeared only briefly at the Martyrs’ Mausoleum in Myanmar’s main city.
She is expected to return later in the day with supporters from her National League for Democracy (NLD), and by mid-morning about 400 activists had already gathered outside the party’s headquarters. General Aung San is widely loved for winning independence from the British, but he died a year before colonial separation.
The country was soon plunged into nearly half a century of junta rule from 1962. (AFP)
