As Myanmar’s military Junta begins its controversial phased general elections on Sunday, the Karen National Union (KNU), the oldest ethnic armed group, has dismissed the polls as a sham designed to manufacture a veneer of legitimacy.

As Myanmar goes to the polls on Sunday in the first of three phases in a tightly controlled election, brightly coloured campaign posters loom over families with children still hacking a living from the rubble of buildings destroyed in Mandalay’s devastating earthquake nine months ago.

In the lacklustre canvassing, the USDP was the most visible. Founded in 2010, the year it won an election boycotted by the opposition, the party ran the country in concert with its military backers until 2015, when it was ​swept away by Suu Kyi's NLD.

Voters in Myanmar cast their ballots in apparently low numbers in a general election, the first since a military coup toppled the last civilian government in 2021.

Projections indicate a junta-aligned party is set to dominate Myanmar’s elections, raising concerns over democratic credibility and continued military influence.

Despite widespread suffering driven by conflict, displacement and disasters, Myanmar’s humanitarian emergency has become “almost invisible” to the world, the UN’s senior official in the country has warned.

Myanmar heads to the polls tomorrow as it battles a civil war that has ravaged parts of the country as well as one of Asia's worst humanitarian crises.

Myanmar’s military leadership has vowed to crack down on cyberscam centers, starting with the notorious KK Park.