Lawyers for Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese democracy leader, said yesterday that she was innocent of any crime as the country’s military dictatorship put her on trial for allowing an eccentric American intruder to stay in her house.

Protesters marched outside Burmese embassies across the world and European foreign ministers debated bringing new sanctions against the country as Ms Suu Kyi appeared in the closed courtroom in the grounds of Insein jail, Rangoon. A delegation of senior foreign diplomats, including Mark Canning, the British Ambassador to Burma, was turned back by soldiers after attempting to observe the trial.

According to her lawyers, Ms Suu Kyi appeared healthy and calm at the hearing in the prison compound where she has been held since her arrest last week. Appearing alongside her were her two friends and housekeepers, a mother and daughter named Khin Khin Win and Win Ma Ma, and John Yettaw, 53, the American who swam across a lake this month to gain access to her heavily guarded house.

Her lawyer, Kyi Win, said that she denied committing a crime. “She just felt sorry for this man as he had leg cramps after he swam across the lake,” he said. “That’s why she allowed him to stay. She did not want anybody to get into trouble because of her.”

“She looked quite well,” said Nyan Win, a spokesman for Ms Suu Kyi’s political party, the National League for Democracy. “She said that she was OK. If things go according to the law we surely will win this case.”

Burmese courts almost never find in favour of opponents of the Government in political trials. An application by Ms Suu Kyi’s lawyers for a public trial was rejected by the judges.

The prosecution then called the first of 22 witnesses, Colonel Zaw Min Aung, of the police, who filed the complaint against Ms Suu Kyi.

“Madam Aung San Suu Kyi allowed him to stay at her residence until the night of May 5, 2009, spoke with him and provided him food and drinks,” the charge sheet read. “We found that Khin Khin Win and Win Ma Ma also helped Madam Aung San Suu Kyi.”

Mr Yettaw, described by his family in the United States as a well-meaning eccentric, is to be charged with trespass and immigration offences.

Mr Canning, along with the ambassadors of France, Germany and Italy, and an Australian diplomat, were turned away. The charges against Ms Suu Kyi have been denounced as a travesty by Western governments and human rights organisations. “There was never any expectation of getting through but we were making a point,” Mr Canning told The Times by telephone from Rangoon.

Times Recommends

• 'New York has lost its edge'
• Copenhagen will fail – and quite right too
• More than 17,000 new underwater species found