Teams of aid experts allowed into the cyclone-ravaged Irrawaddy delta have
returned to Thailand with the bleakest of warnings: Burma is on the brink of
a “devastating public health crisis” if help is not allowed to flow across
its borders immediately.
An American cargo aircraft is expected to land in Burma today, carrying the
only US aid the junta has allowed into the country as supplies pile up by
the side of runways. For the hundreds of aid workers who have flown into
Bangkok from around the world, the chances of entry visas materialising
appeared to fade.
Rumours have begun circulating that the Burmese regime is preparing to close
its doors altogether – a decision, UNaffiliated aid workers said, that would
cost the lives of thousands.
Burma’s state television yesterday revised its count of the number of dead to
28,458 and the number of missing to 33,416, but aid workers believe that the
final toll could reach 100,000. Deaths from hunger and disease could be far
higher, they add.
Burma says that it will accept aid from all countries but does not want to let
in any more foreign workers who would carry out and manage the operations.
So far, only a few of the assessment teams that would normally be on the
scene have been allowed in to do their jobs. Those now returning to Thailand
paint a grim picture of what is needed.
After three days investigating the worst-affected parts of the country,
assessors said that the junta’s de facto blockade on large-scale foreign
assistance was in danger of creating a separate refugee crisis. Tens of
thousands of people left homeless by Cyclone Nargis have, until now, stayed
put in the hope that food, shelter and medical supplies were on their way.
Now that more than a week has passed, many have set off in search of
salvation.
Voting booths sprang up among the destruction over the weekend as the junta
pushed ahead with a referendum on a new constitution.
The White House said it hoped that the C130 aircraft’s flight would be the
first of many. “This is a very vulnerable population, and a shock of this
magnitude is going to take people right off the cliff,” Ky Luu, of the
Office of US Foreign Disaster Assistance, said. “We will be able to make a
difference,” he added. “People are dying, and it’s approaching a week.”
The US military has C130 cargo aircraft and about a dozen helicopters in the
region. US Navy ships have also begun moving from the Gulf of Thailand
toward the country.
President Bush has said that the US wants “to do a lot more”, but added last
week: “In order to do so, the military junta must allow our disaster
assessment teams into the country.”
One of the teams sent by the aid group World Vision said it had discovered
30,000 refugees encamped around the village of Myaungmya. “These are
desperate people who, after a week of waiting, are giving up on the aid
response and heading off in search of food and shelter,” Chris Webster, one
of dozens of World Vision workers trapped in Bangkok, said.
Although some medical and food supplies have begun to trickle into the
country, disaster experts said that they fell far short of what was needed.
Stephan Goetghebuer, of Médecins sans Frontières, said that while the
Burmese authorities had allowed just enough leeway for a few aid shipments,
“it’s no more than a drip-feed, really, given a serious response is more
than required”.
Dysentery and diarrhoea would, said medical observers, tear through the
storm’s survivors as they struggled to rebuild their lives. The warehouses
of undelivered medical and food supplies are infuriating aid groups.
The lack of expertise on the ground is heightening the crisis: the junta’s
stonewalling means that disaster specialists are pacing their offices in
Bangkok just a few hundred miles from where they should be.
They are not the only ones waiting in Thailand in dread over the situation.
Khin, who works as a gardener in Bangkok, is one of the hundreds of
thousands of Burmese people living in Thailand with family back home –
family he now believes have been claimed by the cyclone. Over the weekend,
Burmese migrants protested outside their own embassy in Bangkok, demanding
that the regime drop its objection to foreign aid.
Holding a newspaper bearing aerial photographs of the devastation, Khin wept
as he thought of his sister and her family. “It is terrible not to know, but
it is worst to think that they might have been saved if the foreign aid had
been allowed in,” he said.
Among aid workers who have flown into Bangkok from around the world, emotions
have swung wildly between hope and despair as the odd visa application has
been processed only for many others to sink without a trace.
Donations to the British Disaster Emergency Committee can be made by calling
0870 6060900
I believe humanitarian intervention here is justified. If a country refuses to take care of its people in a situation like this, they have ceded their right to govern.
Nations are just lines on a map. We are looking across these imaginary lines and watching people die.
Conor, Boise,
It is time for US not UN intervention. The regime cowards would scuttle off north to their jungle hideout if troops and relief supplies were landed in the southern delta. This needs stern words and military intervention not negotiation. The only way to deal with this kind of dictatorship is force
Boris, Belgravia, London
Are the "warehouses of undelivered medical and food supplies" within Myanmar or waiting in other countries?The article isn't absolutely clear on this point.Pls clarify.If the warehouses are in Myanmar this would confirm the military defintely need foreign assistance with both aid & its distribution.
Joan Moira Peters, Whangarei (UK Citizen, temp o/seas in NZ)
The US and UN should end the Junta regime for the sake of Myanmar people, more so when thousands are suffering from the the recent disaster where food and medical supplies are not reaching the survivors fast enough due to the arrogance of the junta government.
ricomann, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
It is time for UN intervention.The US military which is nearby can probably have food and water on the ground in the Irrawaddy Delta in an hour.Why is the world letting this happen?George Bush has a chance to do some good in the world and this time France would be at Americas side.DO IT!!
Bruce, Chicago,