AP Photo

Democracy activists pray on the platform of the Shwedagon pagoda in Rangoon, Burma, September 27, 2011. (Photo: Nyein Chan Naing / EPA)

Squeezed between booming India and equally booming China, Burma has long felt like a time capsule of repressive rule, economic mismanagement and military dominance. But is change finally coming to this strategic crossroads? On Oct. 11, in a state T.V. announcement emblazoned with a "breaking news"� banner, the country's government announced a prisoner amnesty affecting 6,359 inmates that would begin on Wednesday, potentially leading to freedom for some of the country's 2,000 or so political prisoners. The same day, a government-run human-rights council urged in an open letter to state media that "what is referred to as...