New York (AsiaNews/Agencies) – The United States is pressing for a briefing in the United Nations Security Council on what it describes as the "deteriorating situation" in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.

In a letter to Russia's UN envoy Andrei Denisov, the current president of the Security Council, US ambassador at the UN John Bolton asked that the UN have a high official prepare a briefing on the situation in Myanmar for the Security Council.

"The human rights situation is appalling", Bolton wrote in his letter. "People are moved from one region to another by force and entire villages are destroyed. Some people have found refuge outside the borders of Burma".

Bolton also accused the regime in Yangon of trying to get nuclear weapons and of committing crimes against the country's ethnic minorities, not to mention the thousand or more political prisoners it detains —including opposition leader and Noble Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, whose house arrest order was renewed on Monday.

At the same time, the military junta is continuing with its plans to move the capital from Yangon to Pyinmana, an isolated mountain region in the middle of the country.

According to General, a well-known leader in the Karen National Union, the reason for moving the capital is two-fold: first, in case of a US invasion, the junta could seek refuge in the mountain forests; second, Pyinmana's geographic location makes it easier for the military to control border regions inhabited by ethnic minorities like the Karen, Shan, Chin and Karenni people, who have been fighting the central government for many years.

For General Sarki, "speed is of the essence in war", and with the armed forced concentrated in the new capital the junta hopes to suppress more easily and quickly any revolt that might break out.