A lawyer for Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of Myanmar’s deposed civilian government, says his client missed her latest scheduled court appearance after she fell ill Monday.
Her legal team said the 76-year-old Suu Kyi appeared ill and complained of being “drowsy” during a pre-hearing meeting in the capital Naypyidaw.
Min Min Soe later told reporters that Suu Kyi was suffering from “car sickness” as she has not traveled by car over the last several weeks, and was taken back home to rest.
Monday’s scheduled hearing was a resumption of her trial on charges of illegally possessing unlicensed walkie-talkies. She also faces separate charges of violating the country’s Natural Disaster Management Law for breaking COVID-19 restrictions while campaigning during last year’s parliamentary elections, breaching the Official Secrets Act, inciting public unrest, misusing land for her charitable foundation, and accepting illegal payments of $600,000 in cash plus 11 kilograms of gold.
Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace laureate, has been detained since February 1, when her civilian government was overthrown nearly three months after her National League for Democracy party scored a landslide victory in the elections.
The junta has cited widespread electoral fraud in the November 8 election as a reason for the coup, an allegation the civilian electoral commission denied.
The coup triggered a crisis in the Southeast Asian country that led to deadly anti-junta demonstrations and clashes between several armed ethnic groups and the ruling junta.
Duwa Lashi La, the acting president of Myanmar’s “shadow” National Unity Government, called for a revolt against junta “in every corner of the country” last week during a videotaped speech posted on social media.
(Some information for this report came from Agence France-Press and Reuters.)
