As world bodies today warmly welcomed democratic reform in Burma, elsewhere in the country Burma’s diverse ethnic leaders busy themselves with worrying developments in the ongoing civil war. While democratic reform occurs in stages, ethnic civil war rages. It seems the newly undemocratically elected government holds cold water in the right hand of change while the left hand holds a fire burning strongly with crackdowns on ethnic armed groups in the countryside.

Ethnic political leaders strongly criticize the Vijay Nambiar of UN special envoy in dealing with the political affairs in Burma in recent day of his trip to the country. This is one of the first times ethnic leaders have criticized the UN envoy.  The ethnic people have yet to breathe democratic change, instead facing ongoing violations of human rights and discrimination. Ethnic leaders see the government’s recent use of chemical warfare as a backward step on the road to national reconciliation. Burma cannot continue to move forward without tripartite dialogue between majority Burman and multiethnic groups.

Is there a genuine change in Burma today? On a small scale, there may be minor change but nothing close to national reconciliation. National reconciliation, in the eyes of Burma’s ethnic groups, is more important than democratic reform. Burma’s problem is not only the struggle for democracy, but the ‘problem’ of the ethnic nationalities.

The government recently declined an offer from the ethnic armed coalition, the United Nationalities Federal Council, to enter discussions on ethnic rights and current civil war issues, instead referring those items to the state government. The government seems to believe that ethnic problems can be addresses at the state level, but not at the national level.

Perhaps Burma today is heading toward democratic change with a good speed, in which both parties of the new government and opposition are united in their positive view of saving our nation from poverty. However, ethnic politics seem left behind, so true progress cannot proceed to the tripartite dialogue.

The world community didn’t want ethnic groups to be left behind and created an approach of the tri-partite dialogue to include in the process of changing nation to not only democratic reform but ethnic rights of power sharing.

The skepticism leveled the new government by ethnic armed leaders is currently increasing after witnessing the severe offensive taken by government forces in the ethnic areas. Ethnic leaders have no more time to think about political change and see the current change as disingenuous. At any moment civil war can drag the country into turmoil, with the army seizing power as they have done in the past.

Ethnic groups have been holding their own state constitutions with a dream of forming a federation in the near future. This dream is the total opposite of the current constitution which does not guarantee any ethnic rights nor political power sharing. It is hard to have a meaningful dialogue regarding national reconciliation by adopting the current national constitution which is plainly viewed by ethnic leaders as a one-sided document. The ultimate goal of ethnic leaders to form a genuine federation base at the state level is under the attack of the 2008 new constitution from the Burmese government.