A two-hour meeting in Rangoon Wednesday (November 4) between a top American official and Burma’s detained pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi has significantly raised the level of diplomatic engagement between the United States and Burma.

US Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell became the highest-ranking American official to visit the Nobel Peace laureate in 14 years.

Earlier, he met Burmese Prime Minister Thein Sein in the administrative capital of Nyapyidaw before flying to Rangoon.

State television, which on Tuesday ignored the American delegation’s visit, broadcast footage of both meetings.

Campbell greeted Suu Kyi, 64, with a handshake at the Inya Lake Hotel near her home where she has been detained on and off for the past 20 years.

Dressed in a traditional Burmese jacket, Suu Kyi was upbeat as she emerged from the hotel after the meeting.

While she did not answer questions, she joked with photographers when they asked her to smile. "Do I look pretty when I smile?" she asked them, then did just that for their cameras.

"Hello to you all," she added before getting into the car that whisked her back to her tightly guarded home.

Later, Campbell told reporters at Rangoon airport that during the two-day exploratory mission, the US delegation had pushed the junta to make progress on human rights and democracy, and to free Suu Kyi and other detainees.

"We stated clearly that the United States is prepared to take steps to improve the relationship, but that process must be based on reciprocal and concrete efforts by the (Burmese) government," he said in a statement.

Campbell said he and deputy Scot Marciel had urged the regime to allow Suu Kyi to meet more often with members of her National League for Democracy (NLD) party ahead of elections that are due next year.

The US ‘fact-finding’ mission followed Washington’s policy shift in September. The Obama administration had said then it would maintain sanctions, and called for free and fair polls as well as the release of Suu Kyi and other political prisoners - but would start a parallel track of diplomatic engagement.

The shift from isolation to engagement came amid a Burma policy review in Washington, and after a visit to Burma in August by US Senator Jim Webb, chair of a Senate subcommittee on East Asian and Pacific affairs.

Apart from Premier Thein Sein, Campbell and Marciel also met Science and Technology Minister U Thaung and Chief Justice U Aung Toe, who helped draft Burma’s new Constitution and put it to a referendum.

The thaw in the cold relations the regime has had with Washington may be the most significant development in years in Burma.

The impasse - with Burma characterising the US as an enemy and Washington calling for regime change and isolating the generals with a series of sanctions - has been a major roadblock to efforts to coax change in Burma.

Analysts see more normal relations as in the interest of both countries.

The regime is keen to see sanctions lifted, and recently allowed Suu Kyi to meet Western diplomats based in Yangon to discuss the sanctions issue.

The developments also come in the run-up to elections in Burma next year which the international community has insisted must be free and fair.

Elections - the first in almost 20 years - will take place under a new Constitution that is designed to entrench military rule behind a facade of elected civilians.

But the election is important to the junta chief, Senior General Than Shwe, who sees it as his legacy and the completion of a carefully calibrated ‘road map to a discipline-flourishing democracy’.

Nyan Win, a spokesman for Suu Kyi’s NLD - which has yet to decide whether it will contest the election - told Agence France-Presse Wednesday that the Campbell visit was the "start of direct engagement between the US and Myanmar government".