(Reuters) – Myanmar’s exiled civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi has been sentenced to four years imprisonment by generals for overthrowing her elected government.

Suu Kyi was found guilty of inciting and violating a law regarding natural disasters. This is her first conviction in more than 12 criminal cases brought against her in relation to the February 1 military takeover. Suu Kyi has reached 76.

Her travels to the U.N. International Court of Justice in Hague, 14 months after the coup, was to help those generals defend themselves against genocide allegations over an offensive by the Myanmar military that killed ethnic Rohingya Muslims.

Suu Kyi was a hero in predominantly Buddhist Myanmar because of her long fight for democracy. The mostly Western critiques she received over the Rohingya’s plight had little impact on her popularity back home.

Known as “the Lady”, Suu Kyi had fulfilled the dreams of millions when her party first won a landslide election in 2015 that established the Southeast Asian nation’s first civilian government in half a century.

In her struggle for democracy, she spent 15 years in house arrest. But her administration was forced to share the same space with the generals that retained security and defense control.

This hybrid government was unable to unify Myanmar’s various ethnic groups and end its decade-long civil conflicts. Suu Kyi, however, oversaw the tightening of restrictions on press and civil society. He also fell out with ex-allies.

However, her November election win did not deter the military. The military took power in February after alleging voter fraud by National League for Democracy. This despite the fact that the monitors and election commission rejected the claims of the army.

Suu Kyi was first charged with violating the coronavirus restriction and possessing unlicensed walkie talkies.

Further charges, such as incitement and corruption, were soon to be brought against her. There are now a dozen other cases that could result in more than 100 year sentences.

Protestors have taken to the streets calling for “Mother Suu’s” release despite the hundreds of deaths and the thousands of detentions that took place since the coup.

LADY BY LAKE

Suu Kyi was the daughter of Aung San independence hero, and was killed in assassination at 2 years of age. She spent most of her youth overseas. After graduating from Oxford University, she met Michael Aris (a British academic) and they had two children.

Aris promised to not let her go home if she had to before she got married. She received the call in 1988 that would change their lives. Her mother was about to die.

She was captured in Yangon (then called Rangoon) by students who rebelled against the junta, which had destabilized the country.

An eloquent public speaker, Suu Kyi became the leader of the new movement, quoting her father’s dream to “build up a free Burma”.

Suu Kyi was detained at her lakeside house after the revolution fell apart, their leaders were killed, and they were sentenced to prison. Publicly mentioning her name could land her supporters in prison. So they called her “the Lady”.

Slightly built and soft-spoken, she played a crucial role in keeping world attention on Myanmar’s junta and its human rights record, winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1991.

Aris passed away in 1997. She didn’t attend Aris’ funeral because she was afraid she wouldn’t be permitted to go back.

She attempted to leave Yangon in 1998 to see her supporters, but was stopped by the army during her brief house arrest. Even though she was dehydrated from the heat and sweltering heat for many days, she remained in her van and slept through several nights.

Pro-military men with spikes and rods attacked her convoy in 2003 and she was killed.

Her house arrest was again imposed by the army. She gave weekly addresses and spoke to her supporters from behind closed gates.

She was a Buddhist devout and sometimes described her struggles in spiritual terms.

The military initiated a number of democratic reforms in 2010 and Suu Kyi was freed before cheering, weeping supporters.

Her success was celebrated in the West. Barack Obama was the first American president to visit Myanmar, and he called her “a source of inspiration to all people around the globe, including me”. The U.S. economic sanctions placed on Myanmar have been lifted. However, Suu Kyi remains cautious regarding the scope of reforms.

The Western optimism that Suu Kyi won the 2015 election saw fade two years later when Rohingya militants attacked security force and the military responded by launching an offensive that ultimately expelled over 730,000 Rohingyas from Myanmar.

In August 2018, U.N. investigators found that the Myanmar military was responsible for mass killings and rape.

Suu Kyi presented the U.N. International Court of Justice with a defense of the military operation. She described it as a counterterrorism reaction and requested that the court dismiss the Gambia genocide accusation.