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| Hillary Clinton says she wants to see Burma's reforms for herself |
US
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is due to arrive in Burma later, in the
first trip by such a senior American diplomat in 50 years.
Mrs Clinton
told reporters she was "quite hopeful" that reforms undertaken by the
government could lead to a broader "movement for change".
She is due
to meet Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi and President Thein Sein on her two-day
visit.
No US
politician of her seniority has visited since an army takeover in 1962.
Burma has
been largely isolated since then, under an autocratic and unpredictable
military regime.
The
military oversaw elections last year that transferred power to a
military-backed nominally-civilian government.
But the new
government unde Thein Sein - a former general - has undertaken some steps
towards reform.
'Flickers
of progress'
Mrs Clinton
told reporters in South Korea that she wanted to see for herself how committed
the government was to change.
REFORM IN
BURMA
- 7 Nov 2010: First polls in 20 years
- 13 Nov: Aung San Suu Kyi freed from house arrest
- 30 Mar 2011: Transfer of power to new government complete
- 14 Aug: Aung San Suu Kyi allowed to leave Rangoon on political visit
- 19 Aug: Aung San Suu Kyi meets Burmese President Thein Sein
- 6 Oct: Human rights commission established
- 12 Oct: More than 200 political prisoners freed
- 13 Oct: New labour laws allowing unions passed
- 17 Nov: Burma granted Asean chair in 2014
- 18 Nov: NLD says it is rejoining political process
"We
and many other nations are quite hopeful that these flickers of progress...
will be ignited into a movement for change that will benefit the people of the
country," she said.
The
government has made efforts to reform election laws and rules banning protests.
It has also released some political prisoners.
The changes
have been rewarded by regional group Asean, which has agreed to allow Burma to
take the chairmanship of the bloc in 2014.
And Ms Suu
Kyi's National League for Democracy has re-registered as a political party.
The NLD had
operated outside the political system for two decades, and Ms Suu Kyi spent
much of that time in detention.
It
boycotted the polls last year because of laws that prevented Ms Suu Kyi and
other senior pro-democracy leaders from running.
These laws
have now been changed and the party says it will field candidates in an
upcoming by-election for seats in parliament left empty by the appointment of
ministers.
However,
critics that the country still holds hundreds more political prisoners, and
that fierce fighting is continuing between government troops and ethnic
insurgents in several states.
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