MONTREAL: Women are being asked to volunteer their undergarments in an international effort to shame Myanmar's ruling junta into giving citizens greater access to humanitarian aid and human rights.

Organisers launched the Canadian edition of the Panties for Peace! campaign this week with a call for women to send underwear to the Myanmar embassy in Ottawa.

According to the campaign, Myanmar's embassies in Europe, Australia and Brazil, among other places, have been receiving female underpants in the mail.

In Yangon, Myanmar's military has started burying cyclone victims in communal graves as Western nations pledged to keep aid flowing despite anger at its detention of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon, who just returned to New York from an aid mission in Myanmar, expressed disappointment but refrained from sharp criticism in light of the disaster. US President George W Bush said he was "deeply troubled" by the extension and called for the more than 1,000 political prisoners in Myanmar to be freed.