YANGON: Myanmar's government accused armed separatists Friday of a bomb attack that killed eight people and left 13 others injured at a market in the country's restive Karen state, state media and officials said.

The bomb exploded late Wednesday as members of the ethnic Karen minority celebrated their New Year at a bazaar in the eastern state bordering Thailand, an official told AFP.

Six people died at the scene and two died later in hospital.

"The New Year's ceremony had already ended so there were not many people still around," said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.

The bomb exploded in Phapun town in Karen State, around 200 kilometres (120 miles) from the economic hub and former capital Yangon, he said.

It was not clear who was responsible for the attack, but English-language daily New Light of Myanmar newspaper, a mouthpiece for the ruling junta, blamed ethnic Karen separatists.

The Karen National Union (KNU) has been fighting the Myanmar government for autonomy for more than five decades.

"The offender is from the KNU terrorists insurgent group that is active in the area between Phapun and the border," the New Light said.

The regime has in recent months stepped up its decades-long campaign against minority groups, with offensives against ethnic Chinese Kokang rebels in the northeast in August and the Christian Karen insurgents in June.

Civil war has wracked the country since independence in 1948, and while most rebel groups have reached ceasefire deals with the junta, analysts say the army is determined to crush the rest before national elections scheduled for 2010.

The government has co-opted some previously hostile rebel groups to become junta-backed border forces that have taken on their former brothers-in-arms.

Military ruler Than Shwe has long made the struggle for the "stability of the state" the main justification for the army's continued dominance over the Southeast Asian nation.

Myanmar has been ruled by the military since 1962.