Burmese opposition icon Aung San Suu Kyi faces expulsion from her own party and is barred from standing in polls this year under the military junta's new election laws unveiled on Wednesday.

In a move swiftly branded "disappointing and regrettable" by the United States, the regime said in a law printed for the first time in state newspapers that anyone serving a prison term cannot be a member of a political party.

Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD) - which won Burma's last elections in 1990 but was stopped from taking power by the junta - would in turn be abolished if it failed to obey the rules.

The Nobel Peace laureate was sentenced to three years' jail in August over an incident in which a US man swam to her lakeside home. Suu Kyi's sentence was commuted by junta supremo Than Shwe to 18 months under house arrest.

"I have noticed that we have to expel Daw Suu. Their attitude is clear in this law," NLD spokesman Nyan Win told AFP , using a respectful form of address to refer to Suu Kyi.

"I was extremely surprised when I saw this, I did not think it would be so bad."

The Political Parties Registration Act also gives the NLD just 60 days from Monday, when the law was enacted, to register as a party if it wants to take part in the elections, or else face dissolution.

"The NLD also needs to reply clearly but I cannot say how we will respond," Nyan Win said.

Polls dismissed

Critics have dismissed the polls, which Than Shwe has promised to hold at a still unspecified date this year, as a sham aimed at legitimising the military's nearly five-decade grip on power.

The 64-year-old Suu Kyi has been in detention for 14 of the last 20 years since the previous elections.

She was already barred from standing as a candidate under a new constitution approved in a 2008 referendum which stipulates that those married to foreigners are ineligible. Her husband, British academic Michael Aris, died in 1999.

"What I can say now is the law is meant to safeguard the constitution. It will be a very big problem for us as they asked us to obey a constitution that we cannot accept," Nyan Win added.

The new law effectively also prevents more than 2,100 political prisoners from taking part in the elections.

It also explicitly bars people from any religious order - including Buddhist monks - and members of the civil service from standing as candidates.

Monks led mass anti-junta protests in 2007, which the regime suppressed with the loss of at least 31 lives.

The act is the second of five laws to have been enacted on Monday ahead of the polls, for which the junta has given no date but which are expected to be in October or November.

The first law stipulates that the regime itself will hand-pick members of the electoral commission.

  Ball in world court

The United States, which like the European Union maintains tough sanctions on Burma, expressed concerns over the new laws and reiterated calls for Suu Kyi's release.

"I think it would be fair to say what we have seen so far is disappointing and regrettable," US regional envoy Kurt Campbell said during a visit to Malaysia, part of a tour of Southeast Asia.

"We would like to see steps taken by the government to encourage domestic dialogue in anticipation and in advance of the elections," Campbell said.

Aung Din from the US Campaign for Burma urged worldwide action in response to the new laws.

"Now, the ball is in the court of the United Nations, United States, and the international community, who have been repeatedly calling for the regime to make an inclusive, free and fair election," said Aung Din.

Win Min, a Burma analyst based in Thailand, said party law was in some ways more of an attack on the NLD than on Suu Kyi.

"Than Shwe does not want the NLD to run for the elections. And it will be very difficult for them - they need to expel Aung San Suu Kyi and the other detained members and they need to agree on the 2008 constitution," he said.

- AFP