• Burma?s State Peace and Development Council?s (SPDC?s) preparations to ensure full control over the 2010 election is fueling instability, with consequences that will dramatically intensify the cross-border economic and security issues already adversely affecting the region. • The expected outcome of Daw Aung San Suu Kyi?s trial, coupled with lengthy jail terms imposed on about 300 activists in the past year, will exclude the most viable pro-democracy opposition candidates from the electoral process. • This has destroyed hopes that the 2010 elections, despite its obvious flaws, would somehow lead to incremental steps towards democratization and urgently-needed reforms. Those who have grudgingly accepted the 2010 elections will now be pressed to choose between resistance and surrender. • The SPDC?s recent ultimatum to key ethnic ceasefire groups to surrender control of their forces and participate in the elections is expected to provoke a resumption of armed conflict. • Growing political and military tensions between the junta and ethnic groups and continued aggression against ethnic civilians is projected to create new waves of refugees flooding over Burma?s borders. • Migrants are being pushed back into Burma because of job losses caused by the global economic crisis. This will be another factor in increasing domestic unrest. A significant number will be vulnerable to recruitment as soldiers by the SPDC Army, its proxies, and ethnic resistance groups. • Reduced remittances from overseas workers have intensified the rapidly deteriorating economic situation. This, along with the SPDC?s failure to address economic woes, is likely to trigger renewed social unrest. • The regime?s violent response to these developments will likely devastate Burma?s fragile stability and intensify cross-border impacts on neighbors already reeling from the impacts of the global economic crisis. • Meanwhile, the 2010 elections are likely to widen the gap between SPDC Army?s top officers and the rank and file. Once appointed to the Parliament, high-ranking military officers will gain additional influence, power, and money-making opportunities. By contrast, the SPDC Army?s rank and file will remain in their miserable and increasingly deteriorating situation. • It is imperative that regional and global political pressure be generated and focused on ensuring that the regime engages in a durable solution that will avoid such destruction. First steps towards the solution will involve the release of all political prisoners including Daw Aung San Suu Kyi who commands broad trust and respect across key stakeholder groups, an inclusive review of the 2008 Constitution, and measures to guarantee that a subsequent electoral process will be free and fair.