Daw Aung San Suu Kyi's pages

Bush meets critic of Myanmar junta

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US President George W. Bush, saying he was concerned over human rights violations in Myanmar, met Monday with a young woman leader campaigning for the rights of minority groups in the military-ruled state.

Charm Tong, the 23-year-old founding member of the widely respected Shan Women's Action Network (SWAN), is a "courageous and compassionate" critic of Myanmar's military rulers, said White House spokesman Scott McClellan.

She "has dedicated her life to helping those who suffer under the military rule in Rangoon and to exposing the regime's abuses, particularly against women," McClellan told reporters.

Charm Tong was named among "Asia's heroes of 2005" by Time magazine this month.

Her SWAN group has documented the reported rape of hundreds of women and girls by Myanmar's soldiers.

A refugee from Myanmar's central Shan state, home to the country's biggest ethnic minority, Charm Tong is based along the Thailand-Myanmar border where she runs a school for young Shan.

"The president is pleased to welcome such a courageous and compassionate woman to the White House," McClellan said.

Human rights groups accuse Myanmar's military of atrocities against ethnic minorities, including displacing more than 300,000 Shan and forcing thousands -- including children -- into forced labor.

"The president said he was very concerned about the human rights violations being committed by the military regime," Charm Tong told Agence France-Presse after the White House meeting, which she said lasted about 50 minutes.

"The president wanted to know what more can be done to help the people," she said.

Bush has imposed trade and investment sanctions on the military regime in his campaign to press for democratic reforms in Myanmar and sought the immediate and unconditional release of pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.

Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy scored a landslide victory in Myanmar's 1990 elections but the military -- which has run the country since 1962 -- ignored the result.

"I raised with the president our concerns on the human rights violations, especially the military's use of systematic rape of innocent girls and women as a weapon of war," said Charm Tong.

She said she was glad that the Myanmar issue had received wide international attention "but at the same time I am sad because the situation has deteriorated and the people continue to be victimized."

Charm Tong, who co-authored "License To Rape," a report which enraged the military junta, said she hoped European countries and Myanmar's Asian neighbors would exert greater pressure on the military rulers.

Her father died last year after being a commander with the Shan State Army, an insurgent group still battling Myanmar government troops.

Earlier this year, she received the 2005 Reebok Human Rights Award, given to those who "risk their lives to fight injustice and oppression."