By Siddique Islam
Washington, DC – In an attempt to visit detained Burmese pro-democracy leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, 13 Nobel Peace Prize winners across the world are submitting visa applications to Burmese embassies in nine countries on Friday, Nobel Peace Laureates say on Friday.
“We hope to visit our sister, who today is spending her 4088th day in detention,” Shirin Ebadi, who received the 2003 Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts to restore human rights in Iran, says in a press statement.
“We want to personally tell her that the world has not forgotten her and the people of Burma, and we want to tell her that we support her movement’s call for a UN Security Council resolution on Burma.”
“We welcome the recent proposal of a Security Council resolution on Burma, and urge all members to support it immediately,” says Jody Williams, 1997 Laureate and one of the founders of the Nobel Women’s Initiative (NWI), who initiated on Friday’s action.
“As the elected leader of the Burmese people, we have to ensure Suu Kyi’s voice reaches beyond the walls that confine her. When I visited her in 2003 she asked that we use our liberty to promote hers and that’s what we’re trying to do,” Williams adds.
Both Jody and Shirin will meet Burmese embassy officials in Washington on Friday and submit visa applications to visit Burma.
While other Laureates are applying for Burmese visas in their respective countries, the Burmese embassy in Seoul on the day rejected the visa application of former South Korean President and Nobel Peace Prize winner, Kim Dae-Jung.
Quoting The Korea Times, Mizzima news reported that Burmese embassy officials rejected Kim’s visa application saying that the move was interpreted as an intervention in the domestic affairs of another country.
Suu Kyi, one of only 12 women to ever win the Nobel Peace Prize, was awarded the Prize in 1991 for leading a non-violent struggle for democracy in Burma.
Despite a landslide victory in the 1990 general elections, the junta refuses to hand over power to her party – the National League for Democracy – and has placed Suu Kyi and other pro-democracy activists, under house arrest.
Suu Kyi, who is currently under detention, has spent nearly 11 of the past
17 years in solitary confinement.
While 13 Nobel Laureates have applied for visas to Burma from nine countries, His Holiness the Dalai Lama of Tibet, Elie Wiesel of the US, South Africa’s Archbishop Desmond Tutu and American Friends Service Committee, who were unable to apply for visas on the day, have expressed solidarity and support for the initiative.
