HONG KONG -- When most institutions, educational or otherwise, celebrate anniversaries, the resulting events usually attract minimal interest and matter little. University of Hong Kong (HKU), as part of its 100th anniversary celebrations, has done considerable better.

On May 30, Burmese pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, winner of the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize, will speak to a Hong Kong audience by video transmission from Burma. This “Centenary Dialogue with Aung San Suu Kyi” is organized by HKU's faculty of social sciences. It's the first time that Suu Kyi has accepted a speaking invitation from an Asian university since her release from house arrest last November.

HKU has been presenting a series of “centenary distinguished lectures” by “some of the world's most brilliant minds”. Suu Kyi, the eighth speaker in the series, will discuss a wide range of issues. No doubt, she will comment on the challenges facing Burma and its partners in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.

The lecture, from 3:30 to 5 p.m., will take the form of a live dialogue, involving HKU professors Ian Holliday and Joseph Chan and commentator Frank Ching as panelists. The audience will listen in Loke Yew Hall, Main Building, HKU.

The daughter of an independence hero, Suu Kyi once lived quietly in Oxford with husband Michael Aris and sons Alexander and Kim. In 1988, she returned to her native Burma to care for an ailing mother and became engulfed in mass protests. Her first big political speech at Rangoon's landmark Shwedagon Pagoda established her leadership of a diverse democratic movement of students, monks, workers and ordinary citizens. Although the revolt was crushed, she led the National League for Democracy to a landslide electoral triumph in a 1990 general election.

Then military leaders reasserted control and placed Suu Kyi under house arrest. Rather than building democracy, the country has endured authoritarianism ever since.

Suu Kyi served three terms of house arrest (more than 15 years). Her most recent release came just days after a highly manipulated 2010 election. Now she again works in hopes of achieving a broad-based national reconciliation and vibrant democracy.

She's also known for her writings about contemporary political issues and her strong belief in education as a force for social change. In Freedom From Fear, published in 1991, she explained the doctrine of non-violent resistance to authoritarianism that always has been her hallmark. In that book and others, she also examined the political role of Buddhism and told of the spiritual values that affect her political philosophy.