Myanmar polls | Aung San Suu Kyi's party claims landslide win

Yangon: She struggled for a free Myanmar for a quarter-century, much of it spent locked away under house arrest. Now, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate whose non-violent campaign for democracy at home transformed her into a global icon is on the verge of ascending to public office for the first time.

Pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi is believed to have won the historic election in Myanmar that saw a record voter turnout on Sunday, the military-ruled country's first in 20 years.

Kyi's party, the formerly-banned National League for Democracy (NLD) claimed that the Nobel Peace Prize laureate has won by a huge margin. The official election results haven't been announced just yet, but if Suu Kyi has indeed won, it will be the first time that she will be holding a public office.

The NLD claimed victories in at least 19 of the 45 available seats and announced to loud cheers that the Nobel Peace Prize laureate had won in Kawhmu, southwest of the commercial capital Yangon, raising the prospect of a sizable political role following a two-decade struggle against military dictatorship.

Kyi had won by a landslide vote the last time Myanmar held multiparty elections in 1990, but was placed under house arrest. The NLD which had earlier alleged poll irregularities now says that the election has been relatively more free and fair than previous years.

If confirmed, the election win will also mark an astonishing reversal of fortune for a woman who became one of the world's most prominent prisoners of conscience. When she was finally released in late 2010, just after a vote her party boycotted that was deemed neither free nor fair, few could have imagined she would make the leap from democracy advocate to elected official in less than 17 months, opening the way for a potential presidential run in 2015.

But Myanmar has changed dramatically over that time. The junta finally ceded power last year, and although many of its leaders merely swapped their military uniforms for civilian suits, they went on to stun even their staunchest critics by releasing political prisoners, signing cease-fires with rebels, relaxing press censorship and opening a direct dialogue with Suu Kyi - who they tried to silence for decades.

Members of a European Union team that observed the by-elections said they was "pleasantly surprised" by what they witnessed at the polling stations but stopped short of saying whether the elections were free, fair and credible. The US has congratulated the people of Myanmar.

The team of six election experts went from Brussels to join the handful of other foreigners invited to watch the voting at polling stations around Myanmar. Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi had said earlier that the elections were not free and fair because of instances of intimidation during campaigning.

Head of the European Union's Elections and Democracy Support Divisions Malgorzata Wasilewska said, "I think the process was convincing enough for me. In the polling stations that I visited, I think I saw plenty of good practice and goodwill which is very important. But we need to hear what other people are saying and without an election observation mission, I would never dare to say whether this was credible or not."

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