Aid agencies struggle with Myanmar cyclone damage

Chronical Tuesday May 6, 2008

Yangon, May 5: Myanmar's military authorities and foreign aid workers struggled on Monday to assess the damage from a devastating cyclone that killed more than 350 people and left tens of thousands homeless.

State media said 20,000 homes were destroyed on one island alone after Cyclone Nargis, a Category 3 storm packing winds of 190 km per hour, ripped through Myanmar's Irrawaddy delta on Saturday.

The death toll is likely to climb as the authorities slowly make contact with islands and villages in the delta, the rice bowl of the former Burma. "The government is having as much trouble as anyone else in getting a full overview. Roads are not accessible and many small villages were hit and will take time to reach," Terje Skavdal, regional head of the U.N. office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA), told Reuters in Bangkok.

The movements of foreign aid workers are restricted by the military, which has ruled the former Burma for 46 years and is largely spurned by the international community due to its repressive policies.

A new policy imposed on foreign aid agencies in 2006 requires travel permits and official escorts for field trips. It also tightened rules on the transport of supplies and materials. "That is the existing situation for international staff. The way most agencies work is they use national staff who have more freedom to move," Skavdal said "We will have a dialogue with the government to try to get access to the people affected." The regime named Prime Minister Thein Sein to lead its relief effort in five declared disaster zones. However, the carnage left by Nargis has not derailed a May 10 referendum on a new army-drafted constitution.

"The referendum is only a few days away and the people are eagerly looking forward to voting," the junta said in a statement confirming the vote would go ahead as planned.

The charter is part of a "roadmap to democracy" meant to culminate in multiparty elections in 2010, but critics say it allows the army to retain an unacceptable degree of power.

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