South Korean President Lee Myung-bak is set to meet Myanmar's Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi in Yangon (formerly Rangoon) on Tuesday, a day after he had talks with President Thein Sein in capital Nay Pyi Taw.
Lee is currently touring Myanmar, previously known as Burma, to discuss economic cooperation between the two nations with Myanmar's new civilian government that replaced the previous military junta last year. He arrived in the Southeast Asian country from Beijing, where the South Korean leader attended a trilateral summit with his Chinese and Japanese counterparts.
Notably, Lee is the first South Korean president to visit Myanmar since a 1983 North Korean bomb attack targeting then South Korean President Chun Doo-hwan killed 21 people, including 17 South Korean officials and four Burmese people. Nevertheless, Chun escaped the attack unhurt.
One of the three suspects identified in connection with the attack died while being arrested. One of the remaining two was jailed for life after he confessed to his role in the attack, while the third was hanged. Although Burma severed diplomatic relations with North Korea after the attack, it revived ties with the reclusive Stalinist nation in 2007.
In the wake of the 1983 bomb attack, security has been intensified across Myanmar during Lee's visit as a precaution. Hundreds of police officers as well as security personnel were seen patrolling the streets in Rangoon, the site of the 1983 attack, from Monday night.
A day earlier, Myanmar had agreed to free a North Korean dissident serving a prison sentence from 2010 for crossing over the border illegally. A Yonhap news agency report suggested that the unidentified man will soon be allowed to travel to South Korea. The report also indicated that Myanmar has agreed to honor a U.N. resolution targeting North Korea over its controversial nuclear and missile programs.
The developments come after Suu Kyi and other members of her National League for Democracy (NLD) party who won in the recent by-elections were sworn into Parliament earlier this month. Although the NLD members had initially demanded changing the wordings of the official oath into Parliament, they later recited the oath in its current form.
The NLD had secured 40 of the 45 seats contested in the by-elections. Suu Kyi herself was overwhelmingly elected from the rural township of Kawhmu. Nevertheless, the Army and its proxy Union Solidarity and Development Party (USDP) still dominate the 664-seat bi-cameral Parliament with about 80 percent seats.
NLD had secured a landslide victory in the 1990 elections, but could not assume power as the ruling military junta refused to recognize the poll results. Suu Kyi herself was under house-arrest for most of the past 20 years. Although the NLD had boycotted the November 2010 polls, it later decided to rejoin mainstream politics and was subsequently allowed to contest the by-polls.
Following the widely acclaimed by-polls, Western powers, including the United States, Britain, EU and Australia, have softened their approach toward Myanmar in recent weeks and eased some of their sanctions imposed on the previous military junta, mostly over continued detention of political prisoners and suppression of pro-democracy protests.
Since assuming power in March 2011, the new government led by President Thein Sein have released thousands of political prisoners detained by the previous military junta and implemented several reforms demanded by the Opposition and the international community.
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June 12, 2026 17:14 ET Major central bank action was the focus this week in economic news. The European Central Bank became the first major central bank to move in response to the rising inflationary pressures in the backdrop of the conflict in the Middle East. In North America, the U.S. inflation and trade data as well as Canada’s central bank decision gained attention. The Chinese trade data was the main news in Asia.