Members of Free Burma Coalition display a birthday cake and a picture Suu Kyi to celebrate her 64th birthday and denounce her recent detention. -- PHOTO: REUTERS
YANGON - SUPPORTERS of imprisoned Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi offered breakfast to Buddhist monks on Friday as they kicked off worldwide events to mark her 64th birthday, witnesses said.
Celebrities join birthday campaign
BANGKOK - BEATLES legend Paul McCartney and John Lennon's widow Yoko Ono added messages to a website on Friday calling for the release of Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi on her 64th birthday.
The pair posted on the '64 for Aung San Suu Kyi' campaign site (www.64forsuu.org), joining other famous names including British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and US actors George Clooney and Julia Roberts.
PHNOM PENH - CAMBODIAN police halted a birthday ceremony for Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi at a pagoda Friday, forcing about 20 activists to move their prayers to a nearby office.
As he was ushered to the street, a Myanmar refugee told AFP that approximately half an hour before the evening reception was to begin, anti-riot police informed Cambodian monks at Lanka pagoda that it would not be allowed.
The Nobel laureate is spending her birthday at Yangon's notorious Insein prison, where she is being held on charges of violating her house arrest after an American man swam to her lakeside house.
Amid tight security at the headquarters of her National League for Democracy (NLD) in Yangon, party members marked the occasion by offering a dawn meal to monks and releasing colourful balloons, witnesses said.
It is not the first time their leader has been absent from her own birthday celebrations - she has spent 13 of the past 19 years in detention since the junta refused to recognise the NLD's landslide victory elections in 1990.
'We have to hold the birthday party without the host again. We would be very happy if she could be released, we are hoping and praying for this,' senior party member Lei Lei said late on Thursday.
Ms Suu Kyi's supporters, wearing yellow T-shirts depicting her portrait, were set to hold an official ceremony mid-morning after the release of doves and sparrows.
Their leader faces five years in prison if convicted in her trial, which has provoked international outrage, and admirers across the world are marking her birthday with calls for her release.
The US State Department, in a birthday message, urged the junta to free her 'immediately' and European leaders are set to make a 64-word call on Friday for the junta to free her.
Celebrities including Julia Roberts and George Clooney have also made online appeals. -- AFP
