WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton welcomed Myanmar’s Suu Kyi to the State Department yesterday at the start of her landmark tour of America.

Nine months after they met at the Nobel laureate’s crumbling lakeside villa in Yangon, Suu Kyi and Clinton will discuss the political changes in the country also known as Burma and whether Washington should ease its remaining economic sanctions in response to the reforms.

Hours before Suu Kyi touched down in Washington on Monday, Myanmar announced a new round of more than 500 prisoner releases, reportedly including political detainees. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said Monday the US has yet to identify those freed and declined to comment on whether the US could soon waive its import ban.

Since Suu Kyi herself was freed from house arrest in late 2010, she has transitioned from dissident to Parliamentarian. Now confident of her position in Myanmar and free to travel abroad without being barred from returning, Suu Kyi has in the past four months also visited Thailand and Europe, where she was accorded honors usually reserved for heads of state.

She’s also assured of star treatment in the US, where she’s revered by Democrats and Republicans alike. The ceremonial highlight of Suu Kyi’s 17-day US visit will come today, when she is presented Congress’ highest award that she was granted in absentia in 2008 when she was still under house arrest. She is also likely to be welcomed to the White House.

In a sign of diplomatic balancing act, a key aide to Thein Sein, minister of the president’s office Aung Min, who has been at the forefront of cease-fire negotiations with Myanmar’s ethnic insurgents, will have high-level meetings at the State Department today. He will also attend Suu Kyi’s Congressional Gold Medal ceremony at the Capitol.

Suu Kyi is under political pressure from Thein Sein’s government to press the US to remove the remaining sanctions — and it’s a step that she appears willing to consider, although many of her longtime supporters in exile oppose it, saying reforms have yet to take root and Myanmar should not be rewarded at a time when ethnic violence is escalating in some parts of the country.

Fighting in northern Kachin state between the military and ethnic rebels continues and has displaced tens of thousands people.

Communal violence in western Rakhine state in June left scores dead, and Suu Kyi herself has faced some criticism for not speaking out in support of the region’s downtrodden Rohingya Muslims who are denied citizenship.

Despite her global standing and April election to Parliament, Suu Kyi still has little clout in the military-dominated legislature, and rights activists fear that it is military cronies who will benefit most as Myanmar opens up to foreign investors.

Suu Kyi will have a frenetic schedule in the US, combining high-level meetings with award ceremonies and get-togethers with Burmese expatriates and activists who long campaigned for her release.