A US State Department official met Aung San Suu Kyi yesterday in a visit that marked the highest-level talks between a US diplomat and Myanmar’s detained opposition leader in 14 years.
Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell, the top US diplomat for East Asia, greeted Aung San Suu Kyi with a handshake after she was driven to his hotel in Yangon, US embassy spokesman Richard Mei said.
The topic of their discussion was not immediately known, but the meeting offered Aung San Suu Kyi, who wore a pink traditional Burmese jacket, her first trip in years outside the confines of her dilapidated home and Myanmar’s notorious Insein Prison.
PHOTO: EPA
The 64-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate has been detained for 14 of the past 20 years, mostly under house arrest.
Campbell and his deputy, Scot Marciel, are the highest-level Americans to visit Myanmar since 1995. Their trip stems from a new US policy that reverses the previous administration’s isolation of Myanmar in favor of direct, high-level talks with a country that has been ruled by the military since 1962.
Their two-day visit is the second step in “the beginning of a dialogue with Burma,” State Department spokesman Ian Kelly told reporters in Washington on Tuesday after the officials had met with senior junta officials in Myanmar’s administrative capital of Naypyitaw.
“They laid out the way we see this relationship going forward, how we should structure this dialogue,” Kelly said. “But they were mainly in a listening mode.”
Campbell is continuing talks he began in September in New York with senior Myanmar officials, which at the time were the first such high-level contact in nearly a decade.
Campbell met Burmese Prime Minister General Thein Sein yesterday morning before flying to Yangon, the commercial capital, Mei said.
Aung San Suu Kyi was recently sentenced to an additional 18 months of house arrest for briefly sheltering an uninvited American, in a trial that drew global condemnation. The sentence means she will not be able to participate in next year’s elections, which will be the first in two decades.
Campbell was scheduled to meet later in the afternoon with leaders of Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party at their headquarters, followed by talks with other political parties.
For years, the US had isolated the junta with political and economic sanctions, which failed to force the generals to respect human rights, release jailed political activists and make democratic reforms.
The administration of US President Barack Obama decided recently to step up engagement as a way of promoting reforms.
Washington has said that it will maintain the sanctions until talks with Myanmar’s generals result in concrete change.
Campbell was the most senior US official to visit Myanmar since a September 1995 trip by then-UN ambassador Madeleine Albright.
RETHINK? The defense ministry and Navy Command Headquarters could take over the indigenous submarine project and change its production timeline, a source said Admiral Huang Shu-kuang’s (黃曙光) resignation as head of the Indigenous Submarine Program and as a member of the National Security Council could affect the production of submarines, a source said yesterday. Huang in a statement last night said he had decided to resign due to national security concerns while expressing the hope that it would put a stop to political wrangling that only undermines the advancement of the nation’s defense capabilities. Taiwan People’s Party Legislator Vivian Huang (黃珊珊) yesterday said that the admiral, her older brother, felt it was time for him to step down and that he had completed what he
Taiwan has experienced its most significant improvement in the QS World University Rankings by Subject, data provided on Sunday by international higher education analyst Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) showed. Compared with last year’s edition of the rankings, which measure academic excellence and influence, Taiwanese universities made great improvements in the H Index metric, which evaluates research productivity and its impact, with a notable 30 percent increase overall, QS said. Taiwanese universities also made notable progress in the Citations per Paper metric, which measures the impact of research, achieving a 13 percent increase. Taiwanese universities gained 10 percent in Academic Reputation, but declined 18 percent
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft
UNDER DISCUSSION: The combatant command would integrate fast attack boat and anti-ship missile groups to defend waters closest to the coastline, a source said The military could establish a new combatant command as early as 2026, which would be tasked with defending Taiwan’s territorial waters 24 nautical miles (44.4km) from the nation’s coastline, a source familiar with the matter said yesterday. The new command, which would fall under the Naval Command Headquarters, would be led by a vice admiral and integrate existing fast attack boat and anti-ship missile groups, along with the Naval Maritime Surveillance and Reconnaissance Command, said the source, who asked to remain anonymous. It could be launched by 2026, but details are being discussed and no final timetable has been announced, the source