Myanmar: Aung San Suu Kyi's mansion goes up for auction, no bids received

Myanmar democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi's lakeside mansion where she spent years under house arrest, was put up for auction on August 15 however, no bids were received, according to AFP reporters.

Following a property dispute between Suu Kyi and her brother, the two-storey house and 1.9 acres of land were auctioned for the second time at 300 billion kyats, which is around 140 million US Dollars at the junta's official exchange rate of 2,100 kyat to the dollar.

The auction saw the presence of a small crowd of mostly journalists, along with armed police who remained on guard behind sandbags.

A notice which was pasted to the door by a local court read "Buildings and every heirloom under the name of Daw Khin Kyi", Suu Kyi's mother, as per AFP.

After the process began, an auctioneer revealed that no body came forward to avail the house even after he asked thrice.

Suu Kyi was confined within the house for 15 years by the military amid demonstrations against the then-junta in 1988. She spent time playing the piano, reading detective novels and meditating as her status as a democracy leader grew.

Hundreds gathered regularly on the pavement outside the property to hear her talk about democracy and fighting military rule through non-violence.

After her release in 2010, she lived in the villa, where she received a string of foreign leaders, journalists and diplomats.

Former US president Barack Obama lionised her as an "icon of democracy" during a visit to the home in 2012.

Suu Kyi left Yangon in 2012 and moved to the capital Naypyidaw to govern as part of an uneasy power-sharing arrangement with the military where she was detained there in the early hours of February 1, 2021 when the military seized power again, ending a 10-year experiment with democracy and plunging the Southeast Asian nation into bloody turmoil.