Aug. 14 (Bloomberg) -- The United Nations Security Council called on Myanmar’s military rulers to open “genuine” talks with detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and begin national reconciliation in the country.

The Council expressed “serious concern” at the extension of Suu Kyi’s house detention by 18 months this week and its political impact before elections planned for next year.

The junta should release all political prisoners and “create the necessary conditions for genuine dialogue” with Suu Kyi and all parties and ethnic groups “in order to achieve an inclusive national reconciliation,” the Council said in a statement yesterday.

Suu Kyi’s detention provoked international condemnation of Myanmar’s military leaders who have ruled the country formerly known as Burma since 1962. U.S. Senator Jim Webb is visiting Myanmar and plans to meet with junta head General Than Shwe for what would be the first talks between a senior U.S. official and the Myanmar leader.

Webb arrived in the capital, Naypyidaw, today and will meet with Than Shwe tomorrow, Agence France-Presse reported, citing an unidentified Myanmar government official. Webb will then travel to the commercial center and former capital, Yangon.

Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy said four senior members were invited to Naypyidaw today, AFP reported. They were told they will meet with an “important person,” the news agency cited Nyan Win, the party spokesman, as saying. He didn’t identify the person.

Hard Labor

Suu Kyi, 64, was sentenced on Aug. 11 to jail for three years with hard labor. The junta commuted the sentence to 18 months under house detention.

The Nobel Peace Prize winner was placed under house arrest at her home in Yangon in 2003. She has spent more than 13 years in custody since the NLD won elections in 1990, a result rejected by the junta.

“Unless she and all other political prisoners in Myanmar are released and allowed to participate in free and fair elections, the credibility of the political process will remain in doubt,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Aug. 11.

The decision to commute Suu Kyi’s sentence is a giant step toward change, according to a commentary in the state-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper, cited by China’s Xinhua News Agency.

The move is aimed at ensuring a win-win situation that gives anti-government groups a good opportunity to accept the verdict and keep on carrying out political activities, Xinhua cited the commentary as saying today.

American Visitor

Suu Kyi was found guilty of breaching the detention order by allowing an American citizen who swam to her lakeside home in May to stay for two days. The American, John Yettaw, was sentenced to prison for seven years with hard labor. Both will appeal their convictions, AFP reported earlier this week, citing their lawyers in Yangon.

Webb, will be the first member of the U.S. Congress to visit Myanmar in more than 10 years. The Virginia Democrat, who is chairman of a Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee on East Asia and Pacific affairs, is on a five-nation tour that also includes stops in Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam.

“His visit to Burma is one stop on a two-week, five-nation tour of Asia to explore opportunities to advance U.S. interests in the region,” Webb’s office said in a statement in his Web site yesterday.

The statement didn’t say whether Webb will raise the sentences on Suu Kyi and Yettaw during his talks with Myanmar government leaders.

State Department

The U.S. State Department helped with the logistics of Webb’s travels, Darby Holladay, a spokesman, said yesterday in Washington. “We welcome Senator Webb’s trip to the region.”

The senator, a Vietnam veteran who served as Navy secretary under former President Ronald Reagan, has worked and traveled in Southeast Asia for almost four decades, his office said.

Before he was elected to the Senate in 2006, Webb visited Myanmar in 2001 to meet with business leaders, workers and members of the junta. In March this year, he said U.S. sanctions against the country appeared to be “counter-productive in terms of our ability to affect the difficulties faced by the Burmese people.”

Webb has advocated the U.S. speak directly with Myanmar’s leadership to work to resolve differences. He said in June that as long as authorities in Myanmar continued the trial of Suu Kyi, “it will be very difficult to pursue a meaningful change in relations with Burma.”

Myanmar holds about 2,000 political prisoners, according to the UN. The elections will take place under a constitution that the opposition says will entrench military rule.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has said Yettaw should be freed. The European Union yesterday tightened sanctions against the junta.

To contact the reporters on this story: Juliann Neher in Washington at jneher@bloomberg.net; Catherine Dodge in Washington at Cdodge1@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: August 14, 2009 02:38 EDT