Myanmar Foils Dissident’s Bid to Board Train

In a renewed attempt to assert her freedom of movement, pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi tried to board a train Thursday, but authorities refused to issue her a ticket, leaving her sitting at the station.

The 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner had tried last month to travel by car out of Yangon, Myanmar’s capital, for political work, only to be stopped on the road.

Suu Kyi and several of her National League for Democracy colleagues were allowed to go to the railway station but were kept from boarding four consecutive trains for the 12-hour, 350-mile journey to Mandalay, the country’s second-biggest city.

The group was told that tickets to Mandalay had been sold out, a party official said.

Suu Kyi, deputy party leader Tin Oo and about 10 members of the party’s youth wing, sat in a waiting lounge after the last train to Mandalay departed. Plainclothes and uniformed police also were in the waiting area.

It was not clear whether Suu Kyi and her colleagues would try to spend the night at the station and attempt to take today’s trains.

Earlier, security forces hauled scores of Suu Kyi’s supporters from the station before she embarked on her effort to assert her freedom of movement and test the military regime’s resolve to impose restrictions.