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YANGON, Myanmar, Dec. 4 (UPI) -- Pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi will be back in court Dec. 21 for an appeal against her house detention, an expatriate news agency said. Previous requests have been turned down. But Nyan Win, one of her defense lawyers, told the New Delhi-based Mizzima agency on Friday that the high court had fixed the date for hearing the appeal request against the Nobel Peace laureate's sentencing by a district court in August.
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"We will submit our arguments on Dec. 21, and the judge will decide whether the appeal has been accepted for revision," Nyan Win told Mizzima.
Suu Kyi, 64, was sentenced to three years in a prison on charges of violating her previous detention in May when an American, John Yettaw, swam across the lake near her house and stayed for two nights in her residence, even though she had urged him to leave.
The trial was given much media coverage worldwide and many heads of government -- including the United States, Russia and China -- were vocal in their condemnation, urging the military junta to release her and other political prisoners.
Analysts said at the time that the coverage had an effect and the head of the military, Senior Gen. Than Shwe, halved the sentence and allowed her to continue serving her time at her lakeside home. She has spent 14 of the past 19 years there under some form of house arrest since she won a landslide general election victory in 1990.
Military rulers have never allowed her to take power and ignored the results. She remains leader of the League for Democracy Party. But it is highly unlikely she will be eligible for next year's elections if she is still under house arrest, as analysts believe is the strategy of the military.
The country's economy has struggled under economic embargoes over their treatment of Suu Kyi and other political prisoners. But she has cooperated with the military in asking that sanctions be lifted against Myanmar, formerly called Burma.
The military has also allowed visiting dignitaries to have private audiences with her. These are believed to be in response to a strategy by Western leaders, including and especially U.S. President Barack Obama, to openly engage with Myanmar's leaders but not lifting sanctions.
One such engagement could come at this month's U.N. Conference on Climate Change in Copenhagen, Denmark from Dec. 7-18. Myanmar Prime Minister Thein Sein will head a delegation to the Danish capital. Included will be Kyaw Tint Swe, secretary of the National Commission for Environmental Affairs, and Kyi Tun, the commission's joint secretary.
A Swedish official has been quoted as saying some EU member states are planning to meet Thein Sein on the sidelines of the conference. "There is an ongoing debate on whether and which EU leaders should meet the Burmese Prime Minister," he said.
