John Yettaw: I would do it again for Aung San Suu Kyi
Richard Lloyd Parry, Asia Editor
John Yettaw, the man whose uninvited visit to the home of the Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi earned her 18 months in detention, said on his arrival back in the United States that he would do the same thing again, apparently in the belief that he thwarted an assassination attempt against her.
“If I had to do it again, I would do it a hundred times, a hundred times, to save her life,” he told the Associated Press after arriving in Chicago on his way back to his home in Missouri. “That they locked her up. It just breaks my heart.”
Mr Yettaw, 53, was released from seven years of hard labour after Senator Jim Webb met Than Shwe, the leader of the Burmese dictatorship, last weekend to plead his case.
The senator's success in liberating an American citizen brought no benefit to Ms Suu Kyi, who along with two female companions was sentenced to house arrest for the crime of giving food and shelter to Mr Yettaw after he swam uninvited to her lakeside house in May.
But his few words to reporters on his repatriation on Wednesday suggest that he still believes he was acting to save Ms Suu Kyi's life. During his trial he said that he had a supernatural vision of her assassination by terrorists.
“I wish I could talk more – I can't,” he said as he was pushed through Chicago’s O’Hare Airport in a wheelchair. He made a gesture of drawing a zip across his mouth, which was covered by a blue surgical mask. Asked whether he was happy to be home, he nodded and made the sign language gesture for “I love you”.
Senator Webb is an opponent of sanctions against the Burmese junta, which has more than 2,100 political prisoners in jail and refuses to, negotiate with Ms Suu Kyi or her party, the National League for Democracy. The party won a general election in 1990, a result which has never been recognised by the military dictatorship.
Mr Webb’s position has been warmly welcomed by Burma's Government, whose official newspapers praised him in editorials yesterday. “Fortune has somewhat smiled on Myanmar's people as there are several visionary officials in the US's top political area like Senator Webb,” said an article carried in three newspapers.
“The more anti-government groups exercise economic sanctions as a means to put pressure on the government, the further the goal of democracy aspired by the people will divert from its route ... all political forces [should] give up the tactic of economic sanctions and collectively open the golden door to a modern, developed and peaceful democratic nation.”view-source:[url]www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas