November 10, 2010

Officials ready Suu Kyi's "Nov 13" release


Aung San Suu Kyi

November 10, 2010 YANGON (KATAKAMI / CHANNEL NEWS ASIA) --- : Security preparations are under way for the expected release of Myanmar's detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in the next few days, officials in the military-ruled country said Wednesday.

"We haven't got any instruction from superiors for her release yet. But we are preparing security plans for November 13," a government official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

Suu Kyi, who has spent most of the past two decades locked up, had her detention extended by 18 months in August last year over a bizarre incident in which an American man swam uninvited to her lakeside home.

Her lawyers say the current period of detention started with her imprisonment on May 14 last year and they expect her to be freed on Saturday.

Another official, who also did not want to be named, said: "We don't have the order yet. It will be at the last minute."

Nyan Win, a spokesman for Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD), said the party had compiled a list of members who would meet Suu Kyi after her release.

"We will draw up a plan for the future after she meets with these people," Nyan Win, who is also one of Suu Kyi's lawyers, told AFP.

He said her party had not received any information from the authorities about when she would be released.

"They never told us in advance in the past. But what I want to say is they should inform her when she will be freed. That's why we will ask them today (with a letter) to inform us about the matter," he said.

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