Aung San Suu Kyi was sentenced to three years' jail and hard labour by a Burmese court today, but the head of the ruling junta commuted the punishment to 18 months' house arrest, a minister said.

The court sentenced her on charges of breaching the terms of her house arrest after a bizarre incident in which an American man, John Yettaw, swam to her lakeside house in May, an AFP correspondent in court said.