The junta has made some headway in securing a number of cease-fire agreements, although a lasting peace is still nowhere in sight. But over the past decade, with little regard for international norms, the junta has directed their attacks towards civilians, as part of a campaign that human-rights organisations describe as a concerted effort to deny the rebel armies any possible support base.

Since the start of this latest round of fighting, which erupted last November, more than 11,000 Karen villagers have been driven from their homes in eastern Burma. Those who succeeded in crossing the border are living under plastic sheets, waiting and hoping for any kind of assistance from the UN or whomever. Many came with stories of rape, misery and abuse at the hands of one of the most condemned regimes in the world. Footage taken by aid workers who sneaked across the border showed burned villages, destroyed rice fields and murdered civilians in northern and western areas of Karen state, where clashes between Karen National Union soldiers and Burmese government troops occur regularly. The junta's official mouthpiece, The New Light of Myanmar, said yesterday, "Terrorist insurgents are committing destructive acts using various means with the intention of undermining the stability of the state".

This latest Burmese offensive comes amid growing calls for the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to take action against Rangoon. Human Rights Watch has urged the UNSC to include Burma on its agenda, in accordance with its April 28 "Resolution on Protection of Civilians in Armed Conflict". The resolution affirms a collective responsibility of all UN members to protect civilian populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity when their governments do not provide that protection.

China and Russia, two of the five permanent Security Council members, have been blocking action on Burma, perhaps for fear that harsh action against the junta would deny them access to the resource-rich country. But that does not mean the rest of us should allow them to obstruct what needs to be done. There needs to be more pressure put on UN members to approve a commission of inquiry to investigate possible war crimes and crimes against humanity committed since the Burmese military government took power in 1988.

Asean, which appears to be fed up with Burma dragging the organisation down with it, should publicly call on Burma to end its attacks on ethnic minority populations. Last year, Asean quietly asked Burma to surrender its turn as chair of the organisation's annual meeting for fear the boycott by the US and EU would be too great an embarrassment. But today, with hundreds of displaced refugees stranded in dire straits on the Thai border, it's high time that Asean spoke up. And as Burma's friend, Asean owes it to the junta to give it to them straight: stop the atrocities and respect international norms and practices.

The latest move from Rangoon is to paint the opposition National League for Democracy (NLD) and the rebel armies as either outlaws or terrorists. Kuala Lumpur, which chairs the Asean Standing Committee, was quick to tell Burma not to do anything to jeopardise hopes for democracy.

When asked if the situation in Burma was worsening, Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar said, "We would like to see more progress ... but the process is seen not to be moving in the way that the international community expects them to move. Any action they take, like closing down the NLD or not releasing Aung San Suu Kyi, these are all impediments and obstacles to creating visible signs of credibility in terms of the movement towards democracy."