Aung San Suu Kyi appeals against 18-month sentence

YANGON - Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi filed an appeal Friday with the country’s highest court against her 18-month house arrest sentence.

Her detention in her Yangon family home was extended by a special Insein prison court in August after she was found guilty of breaking the terms of her house arrest by briefly sheltering an uninvited American, John William Yettaw.

The 64-year-old has spent 14 of the last 20 years confined to her house by the ruling military junta. This latest sentence should keep her out of circulation next year when the military plans to hold the first general election since 1990.

Suu Kyi’s lawyers said they did not know if her appeal would be accepted after a lower court rejected an earlier legal challenge. She was originally sentenced to three years jail with hard labour but this was quickly commuted to 18 months of house arrest.

Many analysts said Yettaw’s bizarre swim to Suu Kyi’s lakeside home in early May to warn her of an assassination attempt he dreamt about was an unexpected gift to the ruling generals as her previous period of detention was about to expire.

Yettaw, 53, was sentenced to seven years in jail but was soon allowed to leave the country during the visit in August of US Senator Jim Webb, a Democrat from Virginia who is chairman of the US Senate’s East Asia and Pacific Affairs Subcommittee.

The US and many Western countries have warned the junta that if the upcoming election is to be deemed credible then Suu Kyi and the country’s other political prisoners should be released beforehand.