Suu Kyi returns to UK
Aung San Suu Kyi began a bittersweet return to Britain yesterday, during which she will address both houses of parliament and have an emotional family reunion after nearly 25 years in Myanmar.
The democracy icon will also meet members of Britain's royal family and Prime Minister David Cameron during her week-long visit, the longest part of her first trip to Europe since 1988.
She visited the London School of Economics and met staff at the BBC Burmese Service yesterday, on her 67th birthday.
In a debate at LSE, she spoke of the difficulties of reform in her homeland, where she spent much of the last 24 years under house arrest, and stressed the importance of the rule of law.
Suu Kyi said she had been "surprised" and "touched" by the reception she had received on a trip which has also taken in Switzerland, Norway and Ireland.
As a special birthday gift, she was given a photograph of her father, independence leader General Aung San, taken on his visit to London in 1947, a few months before he was assassinated.
Later, she was to attend a family reunion in Oxford, where she studied at the prestigious university and lived for almost 20 years with the late Michael Aris, her English husband and father of her two sons.
The Chancellor of Oxford University, former Hong Kong governor Chris Patten, will formally welcome her.
The university -- where she studied politics, philosophy and economics -- will award her an honorary doctorate in civil law today and she will also deliver a speech in the 17th century Sheldonian Theatre.
Suu Kyi is to address both houses of parliament in London tomorrow, an honour only granted to high-profile foreign dignitaries such as US President Barack Obama.
Her younger son Kim is expected to attend the reunion, but it was not clear if her older son Alexander who reportedly lives in the United States, would be there.
Suu Kyi's tour, which will wrap up in France.
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