Former State Counsellor of Myanmar and Leader of the National League for Democracy From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Aung San Suu Kyi (born 19 June 1945 in Yangon, Burma) is a human rights activist, Nobel Peace Prize winner, and State Counsellor of Myanmar.
Aung San Suu Kyi | |
---|---|
အောင်ဆန်းစုကြည် | |
1st State Counsellor of Myanmar | |
In office 6 April 2016 – 1 February 2021 | |
President | Htin Kyaw Win Myint |
Preceded by | Thein Sein (Prime Minister, 2011) |
Minister of Foreign Affairs | |
In office 30 March 2016 – 1 February 2021 | |
President | Htin Kyaw Win Myint |
Deputy | Kyaw Tin |
Preceded by | Wunna Maung Lwin |
Minister of the President's Office | |
In office 30 March 2016 – 1 February 2021 | |
President | Htin Kyaw Win Myint |
Preceded by | Aung Min Hla Tun Soe Maung Soe Thein Thein Nyunt |
President of the National League for Democracy | |
Assumed office 18 November 2011 | |
Preceded by | Aung Shwe |
Leader of the Opposition | |
In office 2 May 2012 – 29 January 2016 | |
President | Thein Sein |
Preceded by | Sai Hla Kyaw |
General Secretary of the National League for Democracy | |
In office 27 September 1988 – 18 November 2011 | |
Preceded by | Position established |
Succeeded by | Position abolished |
Member of the Burmese House of Representatives for Kawhmu | |
In office 2 May 2012 – 30 March 2016 | |
Preceded by | Soe Tint |
Succeeded by | Vacant |
Majority | 46,73 (71.38%) |
Personal details | |
Born | Rangoon, British Burma (now Yangon) | 19 June 1945
Political party | National League for Democracy |
Spouse(s) |
Michael Aris
(m. 1972; died 1999) |
Children | 2, including Alex |
Parents | Aung San (Father) Khin Kyi (Mother) |
Residence | 54 University Avenue |
Alma mater | University of Delhi St Hugh's College, Oxford University of London |
Awards | Rafto Prize Sakharov Prize Nobel Peace Prize Jawaharlal Nehru Award International Simón Bolívar Prize Olof Palme Prize Bhagwan Mahavir World Peace Congressional Gold Medal |
Signature | |
Website | Party website |
Suu Kyi was not able to be president. Instead, she became the State Counsellor of Myanmar.[2] She brought some democracy to her country with nonviolence. She is the leader of the National League for Democracy in Burma and a famous prisoner. She has been under house arrest several times. Suu Kyi won the Rafto Prize and the Sakharov Prize in 1990, and the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991. In 1992, she was awarded the Jawaharlal Nehru peace prize.
She is sometimes called Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. Daw is not part of her name, but a title for older women. This name shows respect for her.[3] She is called Amay Suu by the people, meaning Mother Suu.
On 1 February 2021, Aung San Suu Kyi was arrested and removed from power by the military during a coup d'état. The military thought the government changed the results of the November 2020 Myanmar general election.[4] On February 3, Suu Kyi was accused of breaking Myanmar's import laws.[5] On February 16, Myanmar police filed a second criminal charge against her, this time for breaking the country's Natural Disaster Law.[6] There were more charges and in December 2022 she was sentenced to 33 years in prison, later reduced to 27 years.[7]
Aung San Suu Kyi was the third child in her family. Her name "Aung San" comes from her father, who is also named Aung San; "Kyi" comes from her mother; and "Suu" comes from her grandmother.[8]
Her father helped to make Burma independent from the United Kingdom in 1947. He was killed in the same year. She grew up with her mother, Khin Kyi, and two brothers, Aung San Lin and Aung San Oo in Yangon. One of her brothers, Aung San Lin, drowned when Suu Kyi was eight.[8] Her other brother, Aung San Oo currently lives in San Diego, California and is an American citizen.[8]
Suu Kyi went to Catholic schools for much of her childhood in Burma. She learned English in school.
Khin Kyi, Suu Kyi's mother, became famous as a politician. She became the Burmese ambassador to India in 1960. Aung San Suu Kyi went to college in India at the Lady Shri Ram College for Women in New Delhi.[9] Suu Kyi continued her education at St Hugh's College, Oxford, and learned about philosophy, politics, and economics. She also went to the School of Oriental and African Studies at University of London in the 1980s.
She moved to New York and worked at the United Nations. In 1972, Aung San Suu Kyi married Michael Aris (1946-1999), a professor of Tibetan culture who lived in Bhutan. She had met Aris when they were both students at Oxford. In 1973, she gave birth to her first son, Alexander, in Queen Charlotte's and Chelsea Hospital in London;[10] and in 1977 she had her second son, Kim also born at Queen Charlotte's and Cheslea Hospital in London.
Aung San Suu Kyi returned to Burma in 1988 to take care of her sick mother. That year, the long-time leader of the socialist ruling party, General Ne Win, retired.
She admired Mohandas Gandhi's use of nonviolence.[11][12] She was also inspired by Buddhism.[13] Aung San Suu Kyi worked for democracy and helped make the National League for Democracy on September 27th 1988. Because Suu Kyi was working against the government, she was asked to leave the country, but she did not.
She was arrested in 1989 and placed in prison in 1990. This was after an election which her party, the National League for Democracy, won, but they were not allowed to be in charge of the country. Between 1990 and 2010, she was almost always in her home, which is called house arrest. Burma released her in November 2010. Suu Kyi was going to be released in 2009, but when a man entered her home she was kept on house arrest for another year because she had broken the rules of the house arrest.
After she was released from house arrest, she was elected to be State Counsellor. When she was State Counsellor, Burma had serious problems with the genocide of the Rohingya.
When she was asked what democratic models Myanmar could look to, she said: "We have many, many lessons to learn from various places, not just the Asian countries like South Korea, Taiwan, Mongolia and Indonesia". She also cited "the eastern European countries, which made the transition from communist autocracy to democracy in the 1980s and 1990s, and the Latin American countries, which made the transition from military governments". She added that "we wish to learn from everybody who has achieved a transition to democracy, and also (...) because we are so far behind everybody else, we can also learn which mistakes we should avoid."[14]
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