In the Christmas of 2001, rock icon Bono of the hugely popular Irish band U2 wrote 'Walk On' for Burma's top dissident Aung San Suu Kyi. ''You could have flown away - a singing bird in an open cage who will only fly, only fly for freedom,'' he sang.

Three years later, Suu Kyi is still a prisoner in Burma - under house detention by the junta that ironically calls itself the State Peace and Development Council or SPDC. And this Christmas, which falls on Saturday, will see her still trapped in that not so-gilded cage.