US senator Jim Webb has said he had asked Burma to free opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and let her take part in politics during talks that secured the release of an US man jailed for visiting her.
The Democratic senator landed in Bangkok, capital of neighbouring Thailand, with John Yettaw, whose swim to Ms Suu Kyi's home in May led to her renewed detention after authorities said his uninvited stay had breached the terms of her house arrest.
Senator Webb met junta leader Than Shwe yesterday and then flew to Rangoon to meet Ms Suu Kyi at a guest house.
Ms Suu Kyi was sentenced last week to another 18 months under house arrest, and Mr Yettaw's action is widely seen as having given the junta a pretext to keep Ms Suu Kyi out of politics until after an election due next year.
Senator Webb said he had raised the issue.
'I'm hopeful as the months move forward they will take a look,' he said.
'With the scrutiny of the outside world judging their government very largely through how they are treating Aung San Suu Kyi, it's to their advantage that she's allowed to participate in the political process.'
He said the US stood ready to help Burma, which is officially known as Myanmar.
Mr Yettaw was not at the news conference. He went immediately to hospital after landing in Bangkok.
He spent several days in hospital this month in Rangoon.
Mr Yettaw had been sentenced to seven years' hard labour on three charges, including immigration offences.
'I believe what happened was regrettable,' Senator Webb said.
'He was trying to help. He's not a mean-spirited human being.'
Senator Webb, chairman of a US Senate subcommittee on East Asia and the Pacific, is the first member of Congress to travel in an official capacity to Burma in more than a decade and the first senior American politician to meet junta leader Than Shwe.
