Suu Kyi to go abroad for first time in 24 year

Myanmar pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi will visit Bangkok next week on her first trip overseas in more than two decades, according to her party. "She will go to the World Economic Forum in Thailand," said Nyan Win, a spokesman for the Nobel Peace Prize winner's National League for Democracy. The event is being held from May 30 to June 1. The veteran activist also plans to travel to Europe next month where she will accept in person her 1991 Nobel peace prize in Oslo, and address Britain's parliament and an International Labour Organisation conference in Geneva. The 66-year-old opposition leader spent much of the last two decades locked up in her Yangon home by Myanmar's former junta, but has now been issued with a passport and is able to travel abroad for the first time in 24 years. She had previously been unwilling to leave for fear the former British colony's military rulers would not let her return. Myanmar's relations with the international community have improved dramatically since a nominally civilian government took over last year and Suu Kyi won her first ever seat in parliament in by-elections last month.