y - the National
League for Democracy (NLD) - winning a landslide victory, the ruling
junta refused to hand over power. NLD leader and Nobel Peace Prize
recipient AUNG SAN SUU KYI, who was under house arrest from 1989 to
1995 and 2000 to 2002, was imprisoned in May 2003 and is currently
under house arrest. In December 2004, the junta announced it was
extending her detention for at least an additional year. Her
supporters, as well as all those who promote democracy and improved
human rights, are routinely harassed or jailed.

Burundi
Burundi's first democratically elected president was
assassinated in October 1993 after only one hundred days in office.
Since then, some 200,000 Burundians have perished in widespread,
often intense ethnic violence between Hutu and Tutsi factions.
Hundreds of thousands have been internally displaced or have become
refugees in neighboring countries. Burundi troops, seeking to secure
their borders, briefly intervened in the conflict in the Democratic
Republic of the Congo in 1998. A new transitional government,
inaugurated on 1 November 2001, signed a power-sharing agreement
with the largest rebel faction in December 2003 and set in place a
provisional constitution in October 2004. Implementation of the
agreement has been problematic, however, as one remaining rebel
group refuses to sign on and elections have been repeatedly delayed,
clouding prospects for a sustainable peace.

Cambodia
Most Cambodians consider themselves to be Khmers, whose
Angkor Empire extended over much of Southeast Asia and reached its
zenith between the 10th and 13th centuries. Subsequently, attacks by
the Thai and Cham (from present-day Vietnam) weakened the empire
ushering in a long period of decline. In 1863, the king of Cambodia
placed the country under French protection; it became part of French
Indochina in 1887. Following Japanese occupation in World War II,
Cambodia became independent within the French Union in 1949 and
fully independent in 1953. After a five-year struggle, Communist
Khmer Rouge forces captured Phnom Penh in April 1975 and ordered the
evacuation of all cities and towns; at least 1.5 million Cambodians
died from execution, enforced hardships, or starvation during the
Khmer Rouge regime under POL POT. A December 1978 Vietnamese
invasion drove the Khmer Rouge into the countryside, led to a
10-year Vietnamese occupation, a