By VOA News
Burmese state media have dismissed the 1990 election victory by the opposition party of Aung San Suu Kyi, describing it as invalid.
An official newspaper ran a commentary Sunday, saying the recent passage of a military-drafted constitution in a referendum shows that people no longer care about the 1990 results.
The New Light of Myanmar newspaper says Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy should prepare for new elections in 2010 instead of clinging to the results of the 1990 vote.
The NLD party won Burma's 1990 election in a landslide, but the country's military leaders refused to recognize the outcome.
The Burmese military says 92 percent of voters endorsed a new constitution that reinforced its hold on power in a May referendum. The NLD rejected that result, accusing the military of vote rigging.
U.S. President George Bush repeated a call Sunday for Burma's military rulers to free NLD leader Aung San Suu Kyi from house arrest.
Mr. Bush also criticized Burma's response to Cyclone Nargis as "unwarranted." The Burmese military waited weeks before accepting help from international relief workers to deal with the storm, which left more than 130,000 Burmese dead or missing in May and more than two million others homeless.
The U.S. president was speaking in Japan where he is attending a summit of the Group of Eight major powers that starts Monday.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP and AP.
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