Why is Suu Kyi so loved by the Burmese people and so hated by the regime?
More than a just democracy activist, “The Lady” as she is widely known, embodies the struggle of the Burmese people in the face of adversity. Her father, General Aung San, negotiated Burma’s independence from Britain in 1945 before being assassinated by his rivals. In 1988, a month after up to 3,000 democracy activists were massacred by the government, Suu Kyi established the National League for Democracy (NLD). In 1990 the regime called a general election. Suu Kyi’s party won convincingly, securing 392 of 485 seats, but the authorities ignored the result and refused to hand over power. That year she was awarded the Sakharov Prize, and in 1991, the Nobel Peace Prize, the award being collected by her two sons, Alexander and Kim, in her absence. The regime has routinely fabricated a range of charges against her. It even accused the Oxford-educated Suu Kyi of illegally avoiding paying tax when she spent the $1.3m award money from the Nobel prize to establish a health and education fund fo
