Myanmar jail threat to Suu Kyi party on poll boycott: media

Although the National League for Democracy (NLD) -- officially disbanded this week -- was not directly named, the report in the New Light of Myanmar said "a party" was "attempting to mislead the people into misunderstanding the law".

The article said the party was persuading people to "protest against the elections by boycotting" the November 7 vote, the first in two decades in the military-ruled nation. It listed a host of prohibited activities, including "undue influence" to prevent a person from voting and "instigation, writing, distributing or using posters or attempting by other means to disturb voting".

These acts could "on conviction be punishable with imprisonment for a term not exceeding one year or with fine not exceeding one hundred thousand kyats (USD 1,000) or with both," it said.

Suu Kyi, who has been detained for much of the two decades since Myanmar's last election, is due to be released just days after the upcoming vote. The Nobel peace laureate is barred from standing in the poll because she is a serving prisoner, and the NLD opted not to register because of rules that would have forced it to expel Suu Kyi and other members.

An election commission announcement on Tuesday abolishing the NLD and other parties on the grounds that they had failed to register for the poll drew strong criticism from the West.

Critics already fear the election is simply a means to hide the military regime behind a civilian facade.