Aung San Suu Kyi receives honorary doctorate in Canberra

MELBOURNE: Nobel Prize winner and Myanmar's opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been awarded honorary doctorate by the Canberra-based Australian National University.

Suu Kyi received a standing ovation as she accepted a Doctorate of Letters for her outstanding contributions to the service of society yesterday, according to Australian Broadcasting Corporation report.

Suu Kyi, 68, who is here on a six-day trip to Australia, said: "There are too many who believe that we are almost at the end of the road, this is not so, we are just at the beginning.

"But we are confident that we will be able to walk the path that we have chosen for ourselves.

"I hope today that the world will help us to realise our dreams, realising dreams is very hard work."

"I've always said that there is no hope without endeavour, what we hope for we must endeavour to achieve through great hard work," Suu Kyi said, and hoped Australia will encourage Myanmar's democratic journey.

"There is no end to the quest for democracy," she said. "I hope and pray that Australia will be with us along this journey and that the peoples of Australia will always guard what is unique to them - a beautiful blend of the East and the West and be an example of the possibility of genuine unity and diversity."