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    02 April 2012| last updated at 07:20PM

    Merkel congratulates Suu Kyi on victory



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    BERLIN: German Chancellor Angela Merkel congratulated Myanmar’s pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi Monday on winning her first bid for a seat in parliament, calling the election a victory for democracy.

     

    Merkel’s spokesman Steffen Seibert said the German leader had followed the  by-elections Sunday “with great interest” and said these underlined the success  of the country’s nascent reform process.
     
    “The citizens of the country have given a very impressive mandate for the  future political work of the Nobel Peace Prize laureate,” he told a regular  news conference, referring to Suu Kyi.
     
    “The opposition and the government should now be encouraged after this  by-election to continue on the path of democratisation and reforms that they  embarked on together,” he added.
     
    Seibert said the “largely democratic election” marked an “important success  on the path of national reconciliation and democratic opening in Myanmar”.    Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party said it was on course to win  all 44 seats it contested in the by-elections, in which a total of 45 seats  were at stake — not enough to threaten the army-backed ruling party’s huge  majority in parliament.
     
    The results marked a stunning turnaround for Suu Kyi, a former political  prisoner, who was locked up by the former junta for most of the past 22 years.
     
    After almost half a century of military rule, the junta a year ago handed  power to a new government led by President Thein Sein, one of a clutch of  former generals who shed their uniforms to contest a 2010 poll.
     
    The regime has surprised even its critics with a string of reforms such as  releasing hundreds of political prisoners.
     
    But remaining political detainees, fighting between government troops and  ethnic rebels, and alleged human rights abuses remain major concerns for  Western nations which have imposed sanctions on the regime. -- AFP
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