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Pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi claimed on Monday a by-election landslide for her party, which she hoped would mark the beginning of a new era for Myanmar after a historic vote that could prompt the West to end sanctions. The charismatic Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate who led the struggle against military rule in the former Burma for two decades, was one of 44 candidates her National League for Democracy Party (NLD) said won all but one of the legislative seats being contested. The by-elections followed a year of astonishing change for a country that was in...

Burma's Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi has won a by-election for parliament, her party says, after a landmark vote that saw 45 seats contested. Ms Suu Kyi's opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) said she had easily won in Kawhmu. Official results are not expected until later in the week. In a statement, she urged supporters to show restraint in their celebrations. The vote is a key test of political reforms, though the army and its allies dominate the 664-seat parliament. The NLD was competing in its first elections since 1990. 'Dignified' Thousands of people who gathered outside the...

Amid the scramble in newsrooms and government offices around the world that followed Kim Jong-Il’s death, one important piece of news from Asia missed all the headlines. The real news in Asian politics yesterday, the kind of thing that will likely show up in the history books, was a quiet meeting announced by the State Department. If you missed it, it’s because people didn’t cover it much, but for the first time ever, India, Japan, and the US held a round of trilateral talks on the future of Asia and the strategic picture. The session, reads a State Department media...

The introduction of a slew of economic reforms and political initiatives by the Burmese government in the second half of 2011 have significant implications for the carriage of Burmese foreign policy. Indeed, the surprise announcement in September suspending construction of a major Chinese-funded hydroelectric dam is an indication that China’s privileged place in the hierarchy of Burma’s foreign relations―a position it has greatly benefited from since the West shunned Burma in 1988—can no longer be taken for granted. Nevertheless, even as these changes unfold, the two neighbors will seek to maintain close and cordial relations in recognition of inescapable geographical...

YANGON, Myanmar — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said during a landmark visit to Myanmar on Thursday that the U.S. would ease aid restrictions and consider further steps to improving relations with the country's autocratic rulers if they continued down a path of political and economic reform. Clinton described her meeting with Thein Sein, Myanmar's president, as "candid, productive," but cautioned that while the "measures already taken may be unprecedented and welcomed, they are just the beginning." She said Thein Sein told her during a private 45-minute meeting that he "hopes to build on" a flurry of political overhauls...

BALI, Indonesia (AP) — Detecting "flickers of progress" in the long-shunned nation of Myanmar, President Barack Obama announced Friday that he will send Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton to the repressed country next month, the first official in her position to visit in more than 50 years. "We want to seize what could be an historic opportunity for progress and make it clear that if Burma continues to travel down the road of democratic reform, it can forge a new relationship with the United States of America," Obama said Friday during his diplomatic mission to southeast Asia.

Workers in Burma will be allowed to form unions and go on strike under a new law signed this week by the president, officials say. The law permits unions with a minimum of 30 members to be formed and allows strikes if a notice period is given. Unions have not been allowed to operate in Burma since 1962. The law appears to be the latest in a series of changes being introduced by Burma's new military-backed, civilian-led government. Signed on Tuesday, it also sets out penalties for both employers and employees who do not abide by its terms. "Clearly the...

RANGOON, Burma — Burma on Tuesday announced amnesty for 6,359 prisoners, a group expected to include hundreds of political prisoners whose release would be a dramatic sign of opening after nearly 50 years of autocratic rule. The United States and Europe have long demanded the release of political prisoners as a condition for the lifting of economic sanctions on Burma, also known as Myanmar. The sanctions tightly restrict investment, trade and financial transactions. Easing them would probably accelerate a realignment of Burma’s previously close relations with authoritarian China, which was stunned last month when Burmese President Thein Sein halted construction...

Astonishing drawings of British soldiers in brutal Japanese Prisoner of War camps have turned up nearly 70 years later on TV's Antiques Roadshow. The lost sketches showing the appalling conditions the men endured were drawn by artist soldier John Mennie who gave them to fellow PoW Eric Jennings. Mr Jennings never spoke about his wartime experiences and his family were stunned when they found the sketches stashed away in a shoe box after his death.

Barnaby Phillips follows the life of one of the forgotten heroes of World War II.

Myanmar's government invited pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi to a meeting Friday with the new president, an official said, in the clearest step toward a political dialogue since she was released from house arrest in November.

Russia closing deal over 20 fighter jets By FRANCIS WADE Published: 4 August 2011 Russia is believed to be close to finalising a deal over the sale of 20 advanced fighter jets to the Burmese military, which has sought to expand its air power in tandem with ground forces. The MiG-29 planes have been purchased directly from the Russian state exporter, Rosoboronexport, in a deal estimated at more than $US570 million. The additional planes, due to shipped before the end of next year, will double Burma’s fighter jet fleet, and becomes one of the biggest sales of its kind by...

This week deadly armed clashes near Burma’s border with China ended a nearly two-decade-old ceasefire between the Kachin Independence Army (KIA) and Burma’s government. About 10,000 people have fled to refugee camps along the Chinese border and 215 Chinese workers from the Datang United Hydropower Developing Co. returned home after the KIA captured a Chinese-built and operated hydropower plant last week. A KIA spokesperson told the Thailand-based Irrawaddy that the uprising began when the government reneged on an agreement to share electricity generated from the region’s Chinese-built hydropower plants with local people. “This electricity is now going to China, not...

WASHINGTON – John R. Alison, a World War II fighter pilot who helped lead a daring and unprecedented Allied air invasion of Burma, has died, a son said Wednesday. The retired Air Force major general and former Northrop Corp. executive died of natural causes Monday at his home in Washington, John R. Alison III said. Alison's wartime achievements included seven victories, six in the air, qualifying him as an ace, .. Alison was chosen in 1943 by Army Air Forces commander Gen. Henry "Hap" Arnold for a top-secret mission that flew more than 9,000 troops, nearly 1,300 mules and 250...

BANGKOK — Ending a three-day visit to Myanmar, Senator John McCain warned the country’s leaders that “the winds of change” now blowing in the Middle East could spread if governments do not listen to the needs of their people. “Governments that shun evolutionary reforms now will eventually face revolutionary change later,” he told reporters at a news conference in the main city, Yangon, according to wire service reports. He urged the government to free political prisoners and to assure the safety of the pro-democracy leader, Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, who said recently that she was planning to travel through...

WASHINGTON — Arguing that nothing has changed in Burma under the new government, four key American Senators—from both Democrat and Republican parties—have introduced a legislation in the Senate seeking to renew US sanctions against Burma. The resolution approving the renewal of import restrictions contained in the Burmese Freedom and Democracy Act of 2003 was introduced ahead of a visit to Burma by powerful Republican Senator John McCain on Sunday. “I can confirm the senator will be traveling to Burma this week,” a spokesman for Sen McCain told The Irrawaddy. The other sponsors of the resolution are Sen Dianna Feinstein (Dem),...

His name is Clemente Vismara. He spent his life in the missions. He planted the Church where Christianity had never come before. An ordinary sanctity, that simply put into practice the Sermon on the MountROME, May 23, 2011 – The beatification of John Paul II has rocked the whole world like a hurricane. "But there are also other exemplary witnesses of Christ, much less known, whom the Church joyfully points out for the veneration of the faithful": this is what Benedict XVI said at the "Regina Cæli" two Sundays ago. Humble, ordinary saints – including those who will never get...

Cables Portray Expanded Reach of Drug Agency By GINGER THOMPSON and SCOTT SHANE WASHINGTON — The Drug Enforcement Administration has been transformed into a global intelligence organization with a reach that extends far beyond narcotics, and an eavesdropping operation so expansive it has to fend off foreign politicians who want to use it against their political enemies, according to secret diplomatic cables. In far greater detail than previously seen, the cables, from the cache obtained by WikiLeaks and made available to some news organizations, offer glimpses of drug agents balancing diplomacy and law enforcement in places where it can be...

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said Credit Suisse Group helped clients in Iran and elsewhere conduct financial transactions in secret, saying Wednesday the Swiss bank "established a business model to allow these rogue players access to U.S. dollars." Mr. Holder and Manhattan District Attorney Robert Morgenthau detailed a decade-long effort by the bank to carry out transactions from Iran, Libya, Sudan, Burma and Cuba. The men announced a $536 million settlement by Credit Suisse, one of several banks accused in a long-running case that has netted roughly $1 billion in fines. The bank, which paid the biggest of the fines,...

A senior U.S. official arrived Tuesday in Yangon on an unannounced trip to continue Washington's new policy of engaging the military government, in the first visit since the country's recent elections. The trip by Joseph Y. Yun, deputy assistant secretary of state for East Asia and Pacific, comes after widely criticized Nov. 7 elections that were overwhelmingly won by a military-backed party. Yun's visit also will allow the U.S. to review its humanitarian assistance to Myanmar, embassy spokeswoman Adrienne Nutzman said. Yun was scheduled to stay through Friday for a visit that will include talks with senior government officials, ethnic...