YANGON - Myanmar's junta has given the World Food Program permission to use helicopters to send aid to cyclone survivors, the United Nations said on Tuesday, as flags flew at half-staff across the country to mourn the dead.
The first day of a three-day mourning period passed in torrential rain and diplomatic prodding of the reclusive generals to allow more international aid after Cyclone Nargis hit in early May, leaving 134,000 people dead or missing.
The junta in the former Burma has allowed relief flights to deliver supplies to Yangon, the largest city, but had balked at aerial access to the southwestern Irrawaddy Delta, where an estimated 2.4 million people were left destitute.
"We have received government permission to operate nine WFP helicopters which will allow us to reach areas that have so far been largely inaccessible," UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon told reporters before departing for a visit to Myanmar.
Amid warnings that many more people could die in the Southeast Asian country, Ban said he welcomed the government's "recent flexibility" but added that aid workers had so far been able to reach only around 25 per cent of those in need.
Ban said a donors' pledging conference in Yangon on Sunday would be crucial for longer term rebuilding.
The official toll is 77,738 people killed and 55,917 missing, one of the worst cyclones to hit Asia in decades. Myanmar's government has estimated the damage at $10 billion (5 billion pounds).
Ban, due to arrive in Thailand on Wednesday and go to Myanmar on Thursday, said he hoped junta supremo Than Shwe would be among senior government officials he meets.
WAKE-UP CALL
The declaration of a mourning period, after the first post-cyclone visit to the delta by 75-year-old Than Shwe on Monday, was taken as a possible sign the leadership had awoken up to the scale of the catastrophe.
"The old man must have been shocked to see the real situation with his own eyes," one retired government official said in Yangon, where the start of the monsoon season has caused more flooding and misery for storm survivors.
Than Shwe, who has run Myanmar since 2005 from Naypyidaw, a new capital 250 miles (390 km) north of Yangon, was shown on state TV touring hard-hit towns on Monday and again on Tuesday, offering words of encouragement and giving orders.
UN humanitarian chief John Holmes, visiting Myanmar, said military-run camps in the devastated Irrawaddy Delta "seemed well organized" but that most survivors had no shelter.
"There are still a lot of supplies needed to get in the future in terms of food, but not just for now but for some months to come," Holmes told reporters after meeting Prime Minister Thein Sein.
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