Foreign diplomats and journalists were allowed into the trial of Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the Burmese pro-democracy movement, for the first time yesterday.

Their attendance marked a rare concession to international pressure by the junta, which has faced mounting criticism since it arrested and charged Ms Suu Kyi and an eccentric American who swam to her lakeside house, breaching the terms of her house arrest, earlier this month.

Until yesterday the trial of Ms Suu Kyi, 63, which began on Monday, had taken place in a courtroom behind the walls of the notorious Insein jail in Rangoon, and requests by diplomats to attend had been refused.

“Thank you very much for coming and for your support,” she said to the diplomatic corps after the judges left the courtroom. “I can’t meet you one by one, but I hope to meet you all in better days.”

Ms Suu Kyi wore a long traditional red and pink dress and smiled at the diplomats after guards declined permission for her to speak to them individually.

After the hearing she met a smaller group of ambassadors in the prison compound, where she is being held.

Earlier this month she was reported to have been given an intravenous drip after suffering from dehydration and loss of appetite. However, several of the diplomats and the ten Burmese journalists present said that she appeared healthy and focused, despite spending 13 of the past 19 years under house arrest.

Mark Canning, the British Ambassador, said: “She was composed, upright, crackling with energy, and very much in charge of her defence team.” Joselito Chad Jacinto, the chargé d’affaires of the Philippines, said: “She appeared very strong. She sat listening intently and alertly to what was going on. She exuded a type of aura which can be described as moving, quite awe-inspiring.”

Appearing alongside her were her two friends and housekeepers, a mother and daughter named Khin Khin Win and Win Ma Ma, and John Yettaw, the 53-year old American who swam across the lake to gain access to her heavily guarded house.

Ms Suu Kyi is charged with violating the terms of her house arrest, a crime punishable by up to five years in prison, by allowing him to stay. Her lawyers insist that he was uninvited and that she allowed him to remain only because he complained of leg cramps.

The prosecution called a police major who described articles that Mr Yettaw left at Ms Suu Kyi’s house after his unsuccessful attempt to swim away undetected from the house on Inya Lake in Rangoon.

They included a head-mounted torch and two long black dresses, resembling an Islamic abaya, which the intruder apparently left. In an incongruous scene, the two garments were modelled for the court by two women wearing sunglasses. Why Mr Yettaw, a Mormon, would present Islamic garb to Ms Suu Kyi, a Buddhist, was not explained.

“All the paraphernalia of the court room is there — the judges, the prosecution, the defence,” Mr Canning said.

“But I think this is a story where the conclusion is already scripted. I don’t have any confidence in the outcome. While the access we had today was very welcome, it doesn’t change the fundamental problem.” It is very rare in Burma for diplomats to be allowed to witness criminal cases, especially involving political prisoners, and that it happened may indicate the usually intransigent junta’s sensitivity to foreign criticism. On Tuesday, the Association of South-East Asian Nations issued a rare statement criticising one of its members. It called on the Burma Government to release Ms Suu Kyi. A report of the statement was carried prominently by Xinhua, the state news agency of China. This may represent a coded reproach by Burma’s most powerful neighbour and business partner.

Times Recommends

• UN may halt 400-year-old 'freedom of the seas'
• Where the Rosetta belongs can’t be set in stone
• Gas deal on hold, but Ukraine may pay in the end