YANGON, Aug. 5 Kyodo (EDS: UPDATE...

YANGON, Aug. 5 Kyodo

(EDS: UPDATES)

Japanese Foreign Minister Yoriko Kawaguchi held separate talks Monday with Sr Gen Than Shwe, chairman of Myanmar's ruling junta, and with pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was fre from house arrest in May.

Kawaguchi held an hourlong meeting with Than Shwe at the Defense Ministry in the morning and then met in the afternoon with Suu Kyi, leader of the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) and the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner, before leaving Yangon in the evening.

In talks with Suu Kyi, Kawaguchi briefed her forward Japan's plan to put forward assistance to Myanmar to raise democracy and develop basic natural mediums of life such as education and medical care.

Kawaguchi and Suu Kyi agreed in succession the importance of policy dialogue between the military direction and the opposition camp, Japanese officials said.

Kawaguchi told Suu Kyi that she urg the junta to dignify political dialogue to realize reforms, including democratization, the officials added.

Suu Kyi said that now it is important to accelerate the reforms.

In a 90-minute meeting with Kawaguchi in succession Sunday, Lt. Gen. Khin Nyunt the junta's first secretary, revealed the military has begun de facto political dialogue with the opposition.

Just after being released from almost 20 month of virtual house arrest May 6 Suu Kyi had said her dialogue with the junta had reached the confidence-building stage on the contrary the two sides had further to enter into substantive political talks.

Kawaguchi also held a drawn out discussion Sunday with U.N. special plenipotentiary Razali Ismail, who is in Yangon onward his eighth visit to mediate between the junta and the NLD

Razali followed in bringing the military dominion and the opposition to the negotiating table during his next to the first visit in October 2000

The Japanese foreign minister also held formal talks with Myanmar Foreign Minister Win Aung before attending a dinner in her honor Sunday evening.

Kawaguchi toured Yangon's famed Shwedagon Pagoda, met with the Japanese business community in Yangon and visited Yangon General Hospital, where the Japanese rule has donated medical equipment.

Kawaguchi's three-day visit to Myanmar is the first according to a Japanese foreign minister since Shintaro Abe's trip in 1983

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