Washington, D.C. — With rebel fighters of the Forces Nationales de Libération (FNL) now on the edge of Bujumbura, worry grows that efforts to stabilize the Great Lakes region may come undone.

Tuesday, Marc Nteturuye, Burundi's permanent representative to the United Nations, urged the Security Council to act before it is too late. "The Council no longer has the right to procrastinate. The longer it waits, the more isolated becomes the hope of avoiding full-scale war."

However, Burundi's Defense Minister has accused the rebels of waging psychological warfare, spreading "obsessive fear" through propaganda. But workers associated with NGOs in Burundi desbribe a nation sliding into chaos. Burundi is "at the explosion point," said one.

In Kinshasa last month, a UN team met with one of Burundi's rebel leaders, Jean-Bosco Ndayikengurukiye of the Forces pour la Defense de la Démocratie (FDD). In its report to the Security Council, the team said they were struck by the "complexity and intractability" of the situation in Burundi and its serious potential for large-scale violence.

The Arusha talks mediated by former South African President Nelson Mandela appear to be going nowhere. Eight small pro-Tutsi signatories to the Arusha peace accord are agreed on Colonel Epitace Bayaganakandi as their candidate for transitional president, but six other Tutsi parties have offered another candidate. Meanwhile, the Burundi rebel Conseil National pour la Defense de la Démocratie (CNDD) says it will not support a Bayaganakandi presidency. Last month the predominantly Hutu organization called on the UN to officially declare as genocide, killings that took over half a million lives in Burundi in 1965 and 1972.

The pro-Bayaganakandi group has accused the international community of ignoring "the frantic search for a new negotiation framework" and argues that a ceasefire is not a necessary condition for getting started with transitional institutions in Burundi.

Mandela has called on France to play a greater role in helping to settle the conflict. "Burundi is a French-speaking state," Mandela told visiting French Prime Minister Minister Lionel Jospin in Johannesburg last week. "And I am asking France to play a leading role in the search for peace."

In Washington, Bush administration officials will not comment on Burundi at all, although in a brief telephone conversation one did acknowledge that "given the complexity of the situation it is high on our agenda of concern."