Aung San Suu Kyi

Biography

Aung San Suu Kyi was born on June 19, 1945, in Yangon, Burma (now Myanmar). Her father was General Aung San, a hero of Burma’s independence who was assassinated when she was just two. Her mother, Khin Kyi, was Burma’s ambassador to India and Nepal, which introduced Suu Kyi to diplomatic life early on. She went to Basic Education High School No. 1 Dagon and the Convent of Jesus and Mary before studying at Lady Shri Ram College for Women in New Delhi and then at St Hugh's College, Oxford, where she studied philosophy, politics, and economics.

After finishing her studies at Oxford and the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) at the University of London, Suu Kyi worked for the United Nations Secretariat in New York and later as a research fellow at Kyoto University. She married Michael Aris, a British scholar of Tibetan culture, in 1972, and they settled into academia, raising two sons. She lived a relatively quiet life in Oxford for nearly twenty years, focused on writing and research in Southeast Asian literature and politics.

Suu Kyi's life changed in 1988 when she returned to Burma to take care of her sick mother. She arrived during big pro-democracy protests against the military government. Relying on her father's legacy and her beliefs, she quickly became a leader of the democratic opposition, co-founding the National League for Democracy (NLD) in September 1988. Her leadership and dedication to non-violent resistance made her a key figure in Burma's democracy movement.

She was placed under house arrest by the military government in July 1989, starting almost 15 years of detention over a period of 21 years. During this confinement, she received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991 for her peaceful fight for democracy and human rights. Her son Alexander delivered her acceptance speech, which focused on her belief in freedom from fear. Although the NLD won overwhelmingly in the 1990 elections, the military ignored the results and tightened her restrictions.

After her release from house arrest in 2010, Suu Kyi led the NLD to electoral success in the 2012 by-elections and again in the 2015 general elections. Constitutional rules stopped her from becoming president, but she took on the role of State Counsellor in 2016, leading Myanmar's civilian government. However, her global reputation suffered greatly due to her handling of the military's actions against the Rohingya minority. Her leadership ended abruptly on February 1, 2021, when the military staged a coup, detaining her and other civilian leaders, putting Myanmar back under military rule.