Image
© Dominique Aubert / Sygma / CorbisAung San Suu Kyi
Democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi said today she is planning a political tour of Burma, a move likely to measure her popularity and test the limits of her freedom after being released from house arrest six months ago.

Suu Kyi, who spent seven years in detention until last November, was asked at a video conference in Hong Kong to confirm reports she will launch political rallies across the nation, her first tour since being freed.

"I hope to travel ... in the month of June," the Nobel Peace Prize winner told more than 1000 academics, students and members of the public gathered at the University of Hong Kong.

"Where I will be going I can't tell you yet. We are trying to work out the itinerary," said Suu Kyi, who was freed less than a week after a widely criticised election that cemented the military regime's decades-long grip on power.

Suu Kyi's travels around the country have landed her in trouble with the Burmese authorities several times in the past, and the 65-year-old said she had not been given any security guarantees for the trip.

"I have not been given any safety assurance," she said, but added that it was the "duty of the government" to protect every Burmese citizen.

Suu Kyi's most recent stint in detention came after her convoy was attacked by a junta-backed militia in 2003, in an ambush apparently organized by a regime frightened by her popularity.

She was arrested along with many party activists and later moved back to her Rangoon home -- where she had spent most of the past two decades in detention - and placed under house arrest for a third time.

The junta said four people were killed in that attack but her National League for Democracy party put the toll at nearly 100.

The tour will be a test of both Suu Kyi's popularity following an election that has left her sidelined from politics, and of her freedom to travel around the country unhindered by the authorities.

The move is likely to go down well with her supporters, some of whom have been frustrated over slow political change in the reclusive nation since her release.

Suu Kyi's party was disbanded for opting to boycott the November vote because the rules seemed designed to bar her from participating, and the party now has no voice in the new parliament.