New storm deepens misery in cyclone-hit Myanmar
Pastor Dale Morgan
New storm deepens misery in cyclone-hit Myanmar*
Reuters
In the storm-struck town of Kunyangon, around 100 km (60 miles) - YANGON
- Torrential tropical downpours lashed Myanmar's Irrawaddy delta on
Friday, deepening the misery of an estimated 2.5 million destitute
survivors of Cyclone Nargis and further hampering the military
government's aid efforts.
In the storm-struck town of Kunyangon, around 100 km (60 miles)
southwest of Yangon, thousands of men, women and children stood in mud
and rain, their hands clasped together in supplication at the occasional
passing aid vehicle.
Children mobbed any car that stopped, grimy hands reaching through a
window in search of bits of bread or a t-shirt.
Despite such scenes and the latest storm, likely to turn already damaged
roads to mud, the former Burma's ruling generals insist their relief
operations are running smoothly.
However, they issued an edict in state-run newspapers on Friday saying
legal action would be taken against anybody found hoarding or selling
relief supplies, amid rumours of local military units expropriating
trucks of food, blankets and water.
If emergency supplies do not get through in much greater quantities,
foreign governments and aid groups say starvation and disease are very
real threats.
Some cholera has been confirmed among survivors, but the number was in
line with case levels in previous years, the World Health Organization said.
"We don't have an explosion of cholera," Maureen Birmingham, acting WHO
representative in Thailand, told reporters in Bangkok.
Diarrhoea, dysentery and skin infections have afflicted some cyclone
refugees crammed into monasteries, schools and other temporary shelters
after the devastating May 2 storm.
The WHO, which has sent health kits, bleach and chlorine tablets to
treat dirty water, said the peak threat from disease was 10 days to one
month after a natural disaster.
EU URGES OPENING UP TO AID
The European Union's top aid official, Louis Michel, met ministers in
Yangon on Thursday and urged them to admit foreign aid workers and
essential equipment to keep the death toll, which the Red Cross says
could be as high as 128,000, from rising.
Myanmar state television raised its official death toll on Thursday to
43,328. Independent experts say the figures are probably far higher,
with British officials saying the number of dead and missing may be 200,000.
Michel, like so many other envoys before, had made little headway so far.
"Relations between Myanmar and the international community are
difficult," he told Reuters. "But that is not my problem. The time is
not for political discussion. It's time to deliver aid to save lives."
Earlier, the reclusive generals, the latest face of 46 years of unbroken
military rule, signalled they would not budge on their position of
limiting foreign access to the delta, fearful to do so might loosen
their vice-like grip on power.
"We have already finished our first phase of emergency relief. We are
going onto the second phase, the rebuilding stage," state television
quoted Prime Minister Thein Sein as telling his Thai counterpart this week.
Underlining where its main attentions lie, the junta announced an
overwhelming vote in favour of an army-backed constitution in a
referendum held on May 10 despite calls for a delay in the light of the
disaster.
DRIBS AND DRABS
Two weeks after the storm tore through the heavily populated Irrawaddy
delta rice bowl, food, medicine and temporary shelter have been sent in
dribs and drabs to devastated communities.
In Kunyangon, the junta has started distributing small amounts of
emergency food.
But around the town, the countryside remains a mess of half-submerged
trees, snapped electricity pylons or bamboo poles -- the skeletal
remains of a house -- leaning at crazy angles.
Villagers say they are slowly burying the bloated corpses of friends and
relatives that have littered the rice fields for the last two weeks. But
the stench of death remains.
The United Nations says more than half a million people may now be in
temporary settlements.
Frustrated by the speed of the official response, ordinary people were
taking matters into their own hands, sending trucks and vans into the
delta with clothes, biscuits, dried noodles, and rice provided by
private companies and individuals.
"There are too many people. We just cannot give enough. How can the
government act as if nothing happened?" said one volunteer, who declined
to be named for fear of reprisals.
With almost total distrust of the government, private aid is being left
in the care of Buddhist monasteries, to be distributed by the monkhood,
who have immense moral authority.
Going through the roll-call of the needy is a grim task.
"We need to give aid to this family," said one monk pointing to a list
in a temple in one village.
"No," another monk interjected. "They're all dead."
(With additional reporting by Ed Cropley in BANGKOK; Editing by Jerry
Norton and Darren Schuettler)