Suu Kyi says Nobel Peace Prize helped her to be optimistic

Naypyidaw, June 17 (ANI): Nobel Peace Prize winner and Burmese's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi revealed how the prize she won 21 years ago helped her to be optimistic about the future and shattered sense of isolation while being under house arrest.

"If I advocate cautious optimism, it is not because I do not have faith in the future, but because I do not want to encourage blind faith," The Telegraph quoted Suu Kyi as saying in Oslo, Norway.

"Without faith in the future, without the conviction that democratic values and fundamental human rights are not only necessary but possible for our society, our movement could not have been sustained throughout the destroying years," she said.

Suu Kyi received two standing ovations inside Oslo's city hall as she gave her long-delayed acceptance speech to the Norwegian Nobel Committee in front of Norway's King Harald, Queen Sonja and 600 dignitaries.

The 66-year-old had been unable to collect the prize as she feared she would not be allowed back into her home country.

"What was more important, the Nobel Prize had drawn the attention of the world to the struggle for democracy and human rights in Burma. We were not going to be forgotten," she said.

She said her 1991 Nobel award had saved her from the depths of personal despair while also helping to shine an enduring spotlight on the injustices in Burma.

"Often during my days of house arrest, it felt as though I were no longer a part of the real world," she said. (ANI)