Leaked prison logs from early 2024 have provided rare insight into the tightly controlled life of Aung San Suu Kyi, the ousted Myanmar leader spending her fourth year in solitary confinement ahead of her 80th birthday, according to a new report.
The logs, from a specially built detention facility in the country’s capital Naypyidaw, offer a glimpse into her daily routine, eating habits and health as she remains isolated from the outside world under the military government.
Since the military overthrew Ms Suu Kyi’s elected government in a coup in 2021, little information has emerged about her condition as the junta continues to exert strict control over the flow of news from the country.
Ms Suu Kyi was detained along with dozens of elected leaders and activists, and was later handed a combined 27-year prison sentence on multiple criminal charges that were widely condemned as politically motivated.
Now, prison logs covering selected days in January and February 2024 show that Ms Suu Kyi wakes up at 4.30am and ends her day at around 8.30pm. Her daily routine includes over an hour of meditation, prayer using Buddhist beads, and three modest meals.
The logs, along with rare footage of her appearing in a court in 2022, were shared with The Guardian by People’s Embrace, a group of military defectors from Myanmar.
One entry states that Ms Suu Kyi ate two half-fried eggs for breakfast. Her lunch – the heaviest meal of the day – consisted of “two spoons of rice, chicken, fish ball soup, two pieces of chocolate, and a piece of dragon fruit”. Dinner included soup and bread.
She walks around her room for evening exercise and spends several hours reading, mostly English and French novels provided by her legal team.
The records have heightened concern over the ousted leader’s wellbeing as they appear to show that she is receiving only basic, symptom-focused medical care. One day, the logs note, the room temperature reached 31C, which has sparked concerns about dehydration and heatstroke.
A prison source, unaffiliated with People’s Embrace, who saw Ms Suu Kyi in early 2024 noted a subtle but symbolic change in her way of living. The source said she had stopped wearing flowers in her hair – partly because she no longer wanted to.
A video of her appearing in a courtroom shows Ms Suu Kyi sitting with former president Win Myint. They are wearing white face masks, and Ms Suu Kyi is clad in a white shirt and black trousers as she briefly stands, clutching a file in her hands.
Ahead of her 80th birthday on 19 June, her son Kim Aris, who lives in London, has launched a bid to collect a world-record 80,000 messages for her.
As well as asking people around the world to upload voice or video messages for Ms Suu Kyi’s birthday, Mr Aris is urging them to sign an e-birthday card, which will help to raise money to provide humanitarian aid to Myanmar.
The messages will be stored on a disk until Mr Aris can hand them to his mother in person.
Ms Suu Kyi, the daughter of Myanmar’s independence hero General Aung San, who was assassinated in July 1947, spent nearly 15 years between 1989 and 2010 under house arrest.
Ms Suu Kyi raised two children, Kim and Alexander, in the UK after studying at Oxford and marrying a British academic, Michael Aris.
She returned to Myanmar in 1988, initially to nurse her sick mother, but was swept up in the pro-democracy movement in the country.
In 2015, the junta allowed Ms Suu Kyi to become the de facto head of Myanmar following elections, but only if they controlled key ministries, including home affairs and defence, as well as the military budget.
In 2019, she appeared at the International Court of Justice in The Hague to defend her country’s use of military violence against the Rohingya minority, which had invited criticism from human rights groups.
