Trial of Suu Kyi begins, faces 3 to 5 years' jail

By Aung Hla Tun

YANGON (Reuters) - Myanmar's opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi went on trial on Monday charged with breaking the terms of her house arrest after an American intruder sneaked into her home.

If found guilty, Suu Kyi faces up to five years in jail. A conviction would sideline the charismatic NLD leader through the junta's promised election in 2010, derided by the West as a sham to entrench more than four decades of army rule.

Suu Kyi was in good spirits as the closed-door trial began in the former Burma's notorious Insein prison, her lawyers said.

"She looked quite well. She said she was OK," Nyan Win, a lawyer and spokesman for Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD), told reporters.

Suu Kyi has denied the charges against her which were reported for the first time on state-owned MRTV on Monday, five days after the Nobel laureate and two female companions were charged.

John Yettaw, the 53-year-old American who used homemade flippers to swim to Suu Kyi's lakeside villa, also faced trial on immigration and trespassing charges, state TV said.

Security was tight outside the prison in Yangon. Armed police threw barbed wire barricades across roads and ordered businesses to close after dissidents called for mass protests.

Some 200 NLD supporters and scores of junta supporters gathered near the prison but there was no confrontation. One NLD youth leader was briefly detained.