Suu Kyi meets foreign official for first time in 5 years of detention

Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar's former leader who has been detained for more than five years since a military coup plunged the country into civil war, was allowed to meet with a representative of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) for the first time since her ouster, after years of questions about the health and condition of the 81-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate.

A Myanmar government spokesperson said Suu Kyi met Arnaud de Baecque, the ICRC's resident representative in Myanmar, on Monday in the capital Naypyitaw.

The ICRC said in a statement: “The visit was carried out in line with the ICRC’s standards and procedures for visiting people deprived of their liberty, including the opportunity to have a private exchange with Aung San Suu Kyi.” The statement also said such visits give detainees the chance to exchange news with their families.

Suu Kyi's son, Kim Aris, called the Red Cross visit the first positive development involving the democracy activist in more than five years.

“This could be a first step, but it must not be the last,” Aris said in a statement. “I hope this leads to further humanitarian progress, including direct communication with my mother, family access, reliable and independently verified information about her condition, and ultimately her immediate and unconditional release along with that of all political prisoners.”

Aris added that he had not yet received independent confirmation of his mother's health. He previously told Reuters that he had received no news from her for years and feared she might die without his knowledge.

One of four photos released by the Myanmar government shows Suu Kyi in traditional dress, standing without support and shaking hands with Baecque. Another shows the two seated in a wood-paneled room with two chairs and a desk. A third depicts Suu Kyi cutting a birthday cake, and the fourth shows the cake with the words: “Happy Birthday Auntie Suu 29.6.2026.” The date and location of the photos have not been verified.

Myanmar's military government said in December that Suu Kyi was in “good health.” After a meeting of Southeast Asian foreign ministers in Bangkok last month, Thailand's top diplomat Sihasak Phuangketkeow called for access to Suu Kyi “so claims can be verified.”

General Min Aung Hlaing, who led the coup that toppled Suu Kyi, became Myanmar's civilian president in April after a tightly restricted election.

Late that month, Suu Kyi was moved to house arrest after Min Aung Hlaing announced a reduction of her prison sentence by one-sixth as part of an amnesty for thousands of prisoners, while releasing her ally, former President Win Myint. Her charges are widely seen as fabricated and politically motivated.

She currently has 18 years of imprisonment left to serve. This is not the first time she has been detained in her life. A previous military government kept her under house arrest in three spells totaling 15 years, from 1989 to 2010.

Her stature has grown over the years of detention. Her father was a revered general regarded as the father of the modern nation for leading the resistance movement for independence from British colonial rule, but he was assassinated in 1947, just six months before the country formally declared independence.

Suu Kyi herself became a national and international symbol, admired by millions of Myanmar people loathing military rule and praised worldwide as an elegant prisoner of conscience. When the military briefly shifted toward democracy, her National League for Democracy (NLD) party won two consecutive elections in 2015 and 2020.

When the military drafted a new constitution, they included a clause barring Suu Kyi from becoming president. However, NLD President Htin Kyaw appointed her as State Counsellor, making her the de facto leader of the short-lived elected government.

In the years before her ouster in the latest coup, her international image was tarnished by her seemingly dismissive stance toward the Rohingya Muslim minority and her failure to prevent genocidal violence against them, which forced nearly the entire community to flee the country.