Myanmar's Suu Kyi insists she's free to call her country Burma
Yangon - Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi on Tuesday said she was free to call her country Burma, shrugging off authorities'complaints that she refused to use the name Myanmar.
Last week, election commission officials admonished Suu Kyi for repeatedly referring to Myanmar as Burma, the country's former name,in numerous public speeches on her recent five-nation tour of Europe.
"I used that name freely in keeping with democratic principle,"Suu Kyi told her first press conference since her return to Yangon on Saturday.
The Nobel laureate said that former junta leader General Saw Maung failed to consult the people's preferences when he decided to changethe country's name from Burma to Myanmar in 1991.
The name issue became a diplomatic one for the previous junta, which insisted on foreign governments referring to their country as Myanmar, while Suu Kyi and opposition politicians continued to callit by the old name Burma.//DPA
