The availability of these new currencies will allow Australian exporters to sell their goods online to more customers in the Asia-Pacific region in their own money.

“The addition of these new currencies makes it even easier to use PayPal around the world,” said Scott Thompson, PayPal’s president.

PayPal also announced that it has opened its PayPal X global payments platform to third-party developers, for the purposes of developing currency conversion applications using live exchange rates.

Thompson said the new currencies, together with PayPal X, allows users greater flexibility: “Consumers have more choice in how they pay, merchants can conduct business in more markets around the world, and developers can now create multi-currency applications built on PayPal X.”

South Korea’s confirmed cases more than doubled as 11 new cases brought the total number of infected person to 21. Of the 11 new cases, three were children.

A Beijing citizen who was treated on Sunday was China’s ninth confirmed case, while Hong Kong saw its seventh case on the same day.

In the Philippines, a woman from Chicago was that country’s second case, although 15 other people have undergone tests and have yet to receive confirmation of the presence of the virus.

According to the World Health Organisation, 43 countries have reported more than 12,000 cases of swine flu, 86 of which have resulted in deaths.

Smith reiterated his call to release Suu Kyi, restricted to her home prison by the ruling junta after they refused to accept the victory of her National League for Democracy in Burma’s last election in 1990.

“The Australian Embassy in Rangoon has conveyed Australia’s grave concerns over these developments to the Burmese authorities, and is monitoring the case closely,” said Smith. “The Australian government has long called for her immediate and unconditional release and I repeat that call today.”

If Suu Kyi is found guilty of breaching the house arrest, it could see her barred from standing in next year’s election.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesperson Julie Bishop urged the Rudd government to leverage their Asian relationships: “The Rudd government must do all it can to urge the ASEAN [Association of South East Asian Nations] member countries and those nations with closer relations to Burma to pressure the junta into releasing Suu Kyi.”

With the exception of Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand and The Philippines, other members of ASEAN have been silent on issue. Burma is a member of ASEAN.

European ministers are currently in discussions about new sanctions against Burma due to this incident but admitted that previous sanctions by Europe and the USA cannot work while China and India continue to trade with Burma.

“I don’t think additional sanctions will help,” said EU external relations commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner. “We have to reinforce dialogue with Burma’s neighbours. I think that is the way forward. It should always be a subject of discussion with China, India and others.”

Of the ten ASEAN member countries, only Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand and The Philippines have condemned the junta’s actions, raising fears that the organisation’s soft approach is not punishing Burma enough over human rights issues.

“Since Burma was admitted 12 years ago, ASEAN has squandered any opportunity to speak more openly about Burma,” said David Mathieson, spokesperson for Human Rights Watch.

Added Burma analyst Aung Naing Oo: “Burma has been a thorn in ASEAN’s side. They do want to do something, but quite obviously ASEAN has failed in many respects.”

China could use their influence over Burma on this issue, said Mathieson: “China has a lot of leverage over Burma, although they are not willing to use it overtly. Privately they will say to Burma, ‘just resolve this and move on’.”