Burma’s pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has assumed her seat in parliament after spending much of the past two decades as a political prisoner. Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party won a landslide victory in a by-election last month. Supporters hope the Nobel Peace Prize winner will help bring a new era of democracy to a legislature still dominated by former members of the military junta that ruled for nearly 50 years. After taking the oath of office, Suu Kyi told reporters she is prepared to work with the junta and its supporters.

Aung San Suu Kyi: “I have tremendous good will towards the military, so it doesn’t in any way bother me to sit with them. I’m pleased to be sitting together with them.”

Reporter: “But you would like to either reduce their presence or not have them in the parliament?”

Aung San Suu Kyi: “We would like our parliament to be in line with genuine democratic values. It’s not because we want to remove anybody as such. We just want to make the kind of improvements that will make our national assembly a truly democratic one.”