Washington — Myanmar’s planned November 7 election will be merely a “charade” that must not be recognized by the United States or the rest of the international community, a senior US Senator said Friday.President Barack Obama should “renew his support” for Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi and make sure the world is “not tempted to recognize this mockery of the democratic process,” said top Senate Republican Mitch McConnell.

“Although the Burmese junta will characterize the charade it announced today as an election — an exercise that only the junta considers meaningful — November 7, 2010 will be just another day in Burma, marked by continued government oppression and hardship for its people,” he said in a statement.

The comments from McConnell, the US Senate’s minority leader, came after Myanmar’s ruling junta announced the country would hold its first election in two decades on November 7. US officials often refer to the country as Burma.

Aung San Suu Kyi, who has spent much of the past 20 years in detention and is seen as the biggest threat to the junta, is barred from standing in the polls, which critics have condemned as a sham to entrench the military regime.

The election date, announced by state media, falls about a week before Suu Kyi’s current term of house arrest is due to expire on November 13.

Her party, the National League for Democracy (NLD), won a landslide victory in 1990 but was never allowed to take office. It is boycotting the upcoming vote, saying the rules are unfair.