Yangon - Myanmar's junta chief Senior General Than Shwe has agreed to meet with democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi if she stops calling for confrontation, "utter devastation" and economic sanctions against the regime, state-media said on Friday. "If she declares to give them up, the senior general will personally meet with her," said a government announcement published in The New Light of Myanmar.
Than Shwe reportedly announced his preconditions for meeting Suu Kyi to United Nations special envoy Ibrahim Gambari on Tuesday during the diplomat's "courtesy call" with the junta chief.
Than Shwe, 74, who has headed Myanmar's all-powerful military since 1992, is known to personally despise Suu Kyi, the daughter of Aung San, Myanmar's independence hero who was assassinated in 1948.
He has never met with the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and there is a great deal of skepticism about his willingness to do so in the near future.
"Many Burmese suspect that having preconditions prior to the meeting is aimed to be used as an excuse for the failure of meeting," said Khin Maung Win, an editor at the Oslo-based opposition radio station Democratic Voice of Burma (DVB).
"They are creating conditions in advance to blame Daw (Mrs) Aung San Suu Kyi for the failure," he added.
Suu Kyi, 62, has been under house arrest at her family compound in Yangon since May, 2003.
Having been kept in complete isolation, and cut off from her National League for Democracy (NLD) party, it is hard to comprehend how she has been calling for confrontation and "utter devastation" of the regime over the past four years.
The NLD has supported the economic sanctions imposed on Myanmar as a means of forcing the junta to open a political dialogue with the party, which won the 1990 general election by a landslide but has been denied power for the past 17 years.
But it has also called for more humanitarian aid to Myanmar's suffering masses. The latest round of protests was sparked by a doubling of fuel prices on August 15.
The tone of the government's statement, issued Friday, was typical of the regime's past anti-NLD, anti-foreigner propaganda.
It blamed the protests that have rocked Myanmar for more than a month on "a political party and other organizations aspiring to create unrest."
"Unrest occurred due to attempts of those who want to gain power through shortcuts and that of some foreign nations to destabilize the nation," said the announcement.
It blamed the international condemnation sparked by Myanmar's crackdown on monk-led protests last week on "lopsided broadcasts of some international media."
It belittled UN special envoy Gambari by noting he had been granted a "courtesy call" with Than Shwe on Tuesday.
Gambari was in Myanmar on a four-day assessment mission in the aftermath of last week's crackdown on protests.
After meeting with Than Shwe once and Suu Kyi twice he returned to New York to present his assessment report to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
The 15-nation UN Security Council will meet behind closed doors to hear Gambari's report on Friday, but diplomats said they do not expect any immediate decisions from the body. China, which has veto power on the council, has already expressed reservations about taking any drastic action against the regime.
"Myanmar is grateful to some member nations of the UN for their understanding about Myanmar's situation and their principled stances," said the statement in an apparent reference to China.
