It was the first visit by a senior US official in 56 years - the last time was when secretary of state under President Eisenhower, John Foster Dulles visited in 1955.
On 1st December 2011, Mrs Clinton then met privately with Nobel laureate & pro-democracy leader Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi for dinner at the lakeside residence of the senior American diplomat in Myanmar. It was their first meeting, though they had previously spoken by telephone, and the two women greeted each other warmly. Mrs. Clinton recalled a signed poster from a women’s conference in Beijing when she was first lady, which Madeleine K. Albright, the secretary of state at the time, sent to Ms. Aung San Suu Kyi. She responded that the poster remained on the wall of one of her offices. “I am very happy to meet you, finally,” Mrs. Clinton said.
They met again on Friday 2nd December for a final meeting at Suu Kyi's home, effectively her prison until she was released last November after years in detention.
Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy will contest coming by-elections for parliament - seen as the next key test of the government's reform program - and Suu Kyi herself has said she will stand for election, another sign that the pro-democracy leader believes the changes under way are real.
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