Myanmar’s shadow government, the National Unity Government (NUG), has called for the junta's exclusion from ASEAN meetings and praised the creation of a group of three countries, consisting of Indonesia, which chaired the bloc last year, Laos and Malaysia, to address the crisis.

Myanmar will send a representative to a regional summit this week for the first time in three years, a diplomatic source told AFP Tuesday, as the ruling junta struggles to quell a civil war. The conflict will be high on the agenda as leaders from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) meet in Laos from Wednesday,

Secretary of State Antony Blinken will represent the United States at the Association of Southeast Nations summits in Laos this week and expects to discuss human rights in Myanmar, China's "irresponsible" behavior in the South China Sea and Ukraine,

Known as the "Five Point Consensus", the ASEAN-led peace effort for Myanmar has made scant progress since its unveiling in April 2021, just months after the country's military staged a coup and unseated the elected government.

The military government of Myanmar will send a senior official to a meeting of Asean leaders, diplomatic sources said on Tuesday, as the junta struggles in its fight against opposition forces.