[valve bouncer]

A good news story to round off the week.

FROM a shelf on a roadside news-stand, the gentle, smiling face of Burma's long-suffering freedom movement leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, beams down from a magazine, flanked by her son and the family dog.

A few magazines along, there she is again, the West's poster girl of democratic defiance. Yet this is not London or New York, but Rangoon. Today, for the first time in more than 20 years, Ms Suu Kyi is the cover story in her own country.

This would have been unthinkable just a few weeks ago, said one Western diplomat, amazed at the speed of change in one of the world's hitherto most repressive states. Then, no publisher would have dared print her picture, let along distribute it to vendors.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/world/burma-rides-the-winds-of-rapid-change-20111015-1lqe7.html#ixzz1armvIQcs

Of course there's still plenty of time for it to all go tits up but it seems that patience is indeed a virtue. Sanctions also work, eventually, and serve as a great carrot when the end game nears.

 

[ohio]

Pretty amazing story. And woman.

Nice to read some positive news every once in awhile.

 

[Silver]

I got positive news the other day.

Herpes, thanks for asking, assholes...

 

[jimmydean]

I got positive news the other day.

Herpes, thanks for asking, assholes...

The gift that keeps on giving. They don't call that site "Plenty of fish" for nothing, you know.

 

[valve bouncer]

More carrot, less stick from Hilary.

US SECRETARY of State Hillary Clinton has made Burma's purchase of missile technology from North Korea a high priority in her visit this week.

Hers is the first visit in 50 years by a US secretary of state.

Mrs Clinton was due to have dinner last night with Nobel laureate and veteran pro-democracy campaigner Aung San Suu Kyi in Rangoon, the decaying former British colonial capital.


Read more: US urges Burma to widen reforms