Myanmar / TC NARGIS (TC 01B) Update: 84,500 dead

[fasterdisaster]

While the six-digit death toll is cataclysmic now, the death toll will just keep going up and up by indirect effects over several years from now. I wouldn't be surprised if up to a million die from disease and food shortages.

[HURAKAN]

UN humanitarian chief to arrive in Myanmar to push for aid efforts

UNITED NATIONS, May 16 (Xinhua) -- A top United Nations relief official will arrive in Myanmar on Sunday to talk directly with the authorities of the country in an effort to accelerate the relief efforts for victims of Cyclone Nargis, which had killed about 78,000, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said here on Friday.

Ban said at an informal session of the General Assembly that hehad asked Special Coordinator John Holmes, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, to visit Myanmar this weekend.

"He will deliver a third letter from me and attempt to establish contact with the Myanmar leadership with a view toward discussing how the UN can assist the government's immediate and longer term relief effort," the UN chief added.

"The situation in Myanmar is particularly acute due to the country's limited capacity to respond to a tragedy of such magnitude," the Secretary-General said, adding, "more than two weeks after the event, we are at a critical point."

He also said that he would remain in close contact with regional leaders and hope that the meeting of ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations) Foreign Ministers on May 19 and a further high-level pledging conference that he had proposed for May 24 or 25 would help mobilize resources in response to this unprecedented crisis for Myanmar.

UN aid officials say that there has been some slow progress in getting relief supplies and humanitarian workers into the most affected areas across the Irrawaddy Delta in the south of Myanmar, and that the government has shown some signs of flexibility, but more is needed.

Ban Ki-moon's spokesperson Michele Montas told a noon briefing at the UN headquarters Friday that a third plane from the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) reached Yangon Thursday, carrying 40 tons of aid supplies from its stock in Dubai.

The goods were distributed late Thursday evening and Friday to UNHCR's humanitarian partners and those partners are now continuing the distribution of those supplies to as many as 5,000 families in the Irrawaddy Delta, she said.

She also said that a United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) team had reached the remote areas of Myanmar where "the situation was dire for children."

"More than 70 UNICEF assessment and relief missions are in the region, distributing essential survival kits, including plastic sheeting for shelter, water purification materials, medicines, mosquito nets, and cooking materials," Montas said, adding that the UNICEF had warned that children who survived the cyclone were now facing an increasing risk of disease.

"Unless more aid gets into the country - quickly - we face the risk of an outbreak of infectious diseases that could dramatically worsen today's crisis," Ban Ki-moon stressed.

"I want to emphasize that this is not the time for politics. Our concern right now is to save lives -- to help the government of Myanmar and its people," Ban said.

"There is no more time to lose," he said.

[HURAKAN]

Rain deepens Myanmar misery; death toll spikes

Torrential rain lashed victims of Cyclone Nargis on Friday as Myanmar's junta admitted more than 130,000 people were dead or missing, putting the disaster on a par with a 1991 cyclone that killed 143,000 in neighboring Bangladesh.
In a shock update to a death toll that had consistently lagged behind international aid agency estimates, state television in the army-ruled former Burma said 77,738 people were dead and another 55,917 missing.
The May 2 storm has left another 2.5 million people clinging to survival in the delta, where thousands of destitute victims are lining roadsides, begging for help in the absence of large-scale government or foreign relief operations.
In the storm-struck town of Kunyangon, around 100 km (60 miles) southwest of Yangon, men, women and children stood in the mud and rain, their hands clasped together in supplication to the occasional passing aid vehicle.
"The situation has worsened in just two days," one shocked aid volunteer said as crowds of children mobbed his vehicle, their grimy hands reaching through the window for scraps of bread or clothing.
Their desperate entreaties expose the fragility of the military government's claims to be on top of emergency aid distribution for victims of the cyclone, which flooded an area of delta the size of Austria.
Aid groups, including United Nations agencies, say only a fraction of the required food, water and emergency shelter materials is getting through, and unless the situation improves thousands more lives are at risk.
Given the junta's ban on foreign journalists and restrictions on the movement of most international aid workers, independent assessments of the situation are difficult.
Reuters

[HURAKAN]

Very heavy rainfall over the affected area.

[Chacor]

No idea why NRL dropped 96B.

[fasterdisaster]

No idea why NRL dropped 96B.

Maybe because the 'circulation' center(hardly can call it that) is on land right now? I don't really know, maybe we could see it come back once the 'center'(which hardly has any storms right now) gets over water.

[HURAKAN]

World turns up heat on Myanmar

Frustrated world leaders condemned Myanmar's military rulers on Saturday, alleging negligence and possible crimes against humanity by refusing a massive foreign relief effort for the cyclone tragedy.
Just hours after the regime nearly doubled the toll of dead and missing to 134,000, the international community blamed the generals for the fate of up to 2.5 million survivors battling to stay alive two weeks after the storm hit.
The bitter criticisms appeared to mark a shift in tactics after more diplomatic pleas for a full-scale emergency operation fell on deaf ears, even though a second wave of deaths could lie ahead due to starvation and disease.
"This is inhuman. We have an intolerable situation created by a natural disaster," Prime Minister Gordon Brown of Britain, the colonial power of the country once known as Burma, told the BBC.

"It is being made into a man-made catastrophe by the negligence, the neglect and the inhuman treatment of the Burmese people by a regime that is failing to act and to allow the international community to do what it wants to do."

Deeply suspicious of any foreign influence that could weaken its 46 years of iron rule in Myanmar, the junta has insisted on managing the relief operation itself and kept most international disaster experts away.

But aid groups say the government cannot possibly handle the tragedy by itself, with hundreds of tonnes of supplies and high-tech equipment piling up in warehouses, bottle-necked by logistics and other problems.

The groups say even their own operations are short of fuel and the proper trucks to manoeuvre in a disaster zone where bridges are out, flooding has been heavy and new seasonal rains are deepening the difficulties.

Nobel Peace Prize winner Desmond Tutu wrote to Brown as well as French President Nicolas Sarkozy and US President George W. Bush, calling on the UN Security Council to authorise aid drops over the objections of the generals.

"The refusal of the Burmese military regime to accept full, adequate humanitarian aid from the international community is nothing short of criminal, and unprecedented in recent history," Tutu said.

Jean-Maurice Ribert, France's UN ambassador, told a meeting of all members of the United Nations that the situation was turning "slowly from a situation of not helping people in danger to a real risk of crimes against humanity."

Faced with the mounting criticism, the junta flew some diplomats and aid workers Saturday into the heart of the disaster zone -- which has been all but sealed off to the outside world.

But the secretive leadership, who rule from a remote bunker town and are rarely seen in public, are long accustomed to presenting propaganda at odds with the reality of this impoverished nation.

"What they showed us looked very good," said Chris Kaye, Myanmar director for the UN's World Food Programme, after taking one of the state-run tours. "But they are not showing us the whole picture."

The junta has blocked journalists from getting to the southern Irrawaddy Delta, the rice-growing region hardest hit when Cyclone Nargis hit on May 2-3, bringing powerful winds and massive waves that wiped whole villages away.

But those who have got through have returned with tales of unspeakable misery -- thousands begging for food, corpses rotting in swamps and countless reports from people saying they had received little or no aid from the government.

Aid agency Save the Children said up to 2,000 children were lost and unable to find their parents.

Survivors have reported that the military was pushing survivors out of temporary shelter in monasteries, whose revered Buddhist monks helped lead massive protests against the regime last year.

Navy ships from France and the United States are positioned off the Myanmar coast stocked with emergency supplies, but the regime has denied them entry.

The regime is said to fear a possible invasion by the United States, which has criticised Myanmar for keeping democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi under house arrest -- and for its slow moves toward elections promised in 2010.

The government said this week that 99 percent of eligible voters had cast their ballots last Saturday in a referendum it said approved a new constitution which would bar her from office.

Her party rejected the result and said the vote should never have been held amid the cyclone tragedy. The regime has scheduled round two, in the disaster areas, on May 24.

[HURAKAN]

The rains continue.

[HURAKAN]

Burma warned of crimes against humanity
May 18, 2008

THE French envoy to the United Nations has said Burma risks committing "crimes against humanity" in its failure to let in foreign aid for cyclone victims.

Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert appealed for the UN "to finally react strongly, very strongly" to the Burma military regime's defiance, two weeks after Cyclone Nargis. He warned: "We are moving slowly from a situation of not helping people in danger to a real risk of crimes against humanity, and we cannot accept that.

"Tens of thousands of lives have been lost, hundreds of thousands could be lost."

Burma's military junta claims the cyclone killed 78,000, with 56,000 missing. The UN estimates the dead at more than 100,000.

The junta says it can manage alone, despite urgent international pleas to open its doors. While the generals have accepted hundreds of tonnes of relief supplies, they have rejected disaster management experts and teams experienced in distributing aid and helping disaster victims.

Source: The Sun-Herald

[HURAKAN]

Ban Ki-Moon to Visit Myanmar to Speed Up Humanitarian Relief Operations

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will travel to Myanmar this week to try to accelerate relief efforts in the wake of the devastation wreaked by Cyclone Nargis, which may have killed more than 100,000 people and uprooted the lives of 2.5 million others.

Mr. Ban's spokesperson Michele Montas announced today that Mr. Ban is scheduled to arrive in Myanmar on Wednesday for a three-day visit in which he will tour the areas most affected by the cyclone - especially the Irrawaddy delta in the south of the country - and travel to Yangon, the most populous city.

He will also hold meetings with senior officials in the Government of Myanmar, she said, emphasizing that the UN remained willing to work with authorities to try to improve the speed and distribution of relief aid. It is not yet confirmed which officials he will meet.

"The whole purpose of the trip? is to accelerate the pace of disaster relief. He hopes his presence can really make things go faster," said Ms. Montas.

She added that although the situation in the affected region remained dire, it was "not too late to try to save more people." Millions of people are either homeless or have seen their homes become badly damaged as a result of the cyclone and subsequent tidal surge.

Mr. Ban and other senior UN officials, including Emergency Relief Coordinator John Holmes, have voiced repeated concern that there has been slow progress in sending both aid and humanitarian workers to the areas most affected by the cyclone, which struck on the night of 2 May.

Mr. Holmes, who is also Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, arrived in Myanmar today to conduct his own assessment of the situation, and Ms. Montas said the coordination of help on the ground was now better than he had anticipated. Mr. Holmes is due to brief Mr. Ban in Bangkok, the capital of neighbouring Thailand, before the Secretary-General arrives in Myanmar.

Some UN aid officials are inside Myanmar, working with an emergency team from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and others to try to bring humanitarian relief.

Mr. Ban and ASEAN officials have also agreed on holding a high-level pledging conference shortly to generate funds for further relief operations.

Source: United Nations

[HURAKAN]

The rains continue. The western side of the Bay of Bengal remains moist while it's dry to the west.

[Chacor]

Burma 'to accept foreign medics'

Cyclone-hit Burma has agreed to allow in medical workers from neighbouring countries, the Association of South East Asian Nations (Asean) says.

The regional grouping said it would co-ordinate the relief effort.

Until now, Burma's secretive military rulers have allowed very few foreign aid workers into the country - a stance that has been widely condemned.

The UN believes 2.4 million people are currently suffering as a result of Cyclone Nargis, which hit on 2 May.

Asean says there is an agreement to allow medical workers, and disaster assessment teams from Asean member countries, to go in to Burma immediately.

Singapore's Foreign Minister George Yeo announced the move after a meeting of Asean foreign ministers in Singapore.

The BBC's Jonathan Head, who is at the meeting, says Asean is offering itself as a bridge between UN and international agencies and the cyclone-hit areas of Burma.

But he adds there are few details of how this co-ordinated relief effort will work, or how all the international aid and expertise that is available can be channelled.

[Chacor]

Burma to mourn cyclone's victims

Burma's junta has declared three days of official mourning for the victims of Cyclone Nargis, 17 days after the storm struck, state television has announced.

The move came as Burma's closest ally, China, began three days of mourning for its own disaster, the Sichuan quake.

Analysts say Burma's move may indicate it now recognises the scale of the disaster it initially downplayed, and could be more open to outside help.

Earlier, Burma agreed at an emergency summit in Singapore to accept more aid.

Burmese state television announced that the national flag would be flown at half-mast during the mourning period.

"Because many people were killed by Cyclone Nargis, we have declared three days of mourning from 20 May to 22, and will lower flags to half-staff starting at 0900 (0230 GMT) on 20 May," the statement said.

Burma's secretive military rulers have been criticised for the slow response to the 2 May disaster, which left about 78,000 dead and another 55,000 missing.

But at a meeting of regional foreign ministers in Singapore on Monday, Burma promised to accept significantly more international aid to help cyclone victims.

However, it told the Association of South East Asian Nations (Asean) summit that it wanted the aid channelled through regional personnel and organisations, rather than Western agencies.

Correspondents say the junta appears to have accepted the need for foreign assistance, but remains fearful of giving uncontrolled access to Western aid workers.

[Sanibel]

They sound like a paranoid republic. No doubt they need change over there. I bet the people who have been starving without food and water are grateful to their leaders for allowing aid over two weeks later.

[Javlin]

Stories of ghost in the fields of Myanmar will you be the judge interesting never the least

In the middle of the night, in the worst-hit areas of the cyclone, villagers hear voices from the fields.

"Hey …. help us, Hey … help us," the voices say. But when villagers search the fields with their torch lights, no one can be seen.

"We believe it must be the ghosts of those who died, because they died unnaturally in the cyclone," said a villager from Peinneakone village in Laputta Township, Irrawaddy Division, where Cyclone Nargis struck May 2-3.

source

[Cyclenall]

Stories of ghost in the fields of Myanmar will you be the judge interesting never the least

In the middle of the night, in the worst-hit areas of the cyclone, villagers hear voices from the fields.

"Hey …. help us, Hey … help us," the voices say. But when villagers search the fields with their torch lights, no one can be seen.

"We believe it must be the ghosts of those who died, because they died unnaturally in the cyclone," said a villager from Peinneakone village in Laputta Township, Irrawaddy Division, where Cyclone Nargis struck May 2-3.

source

That's odd, the same thing was reported after Hurricane Katrina.

[JonathanBelles]

Question...do the burmese speak english?

And Yes, I heard the same story after Katrina.

[CrazyC83]

Question...do the burmese speak english?

And Yes, I heard the same story after Katrina.

The storm has so many parallels with Katrina, just in a third world country...

[Chacor]

They speak Burmese, not English.

[HurricaneBill]

That's odd, the same thing was reported after Hurricane Katrina.

It also happened after the 2004 tsunami.