Myanmar junta still blocking most cyclone aid

YANGON - A trickle of aid shipments arrived in Myanmar on Sunday, more than a week after a massive cyclone smashed the country, but officials continued to bar major shipments to the storm's hard-hit survivors.
The junta is refusing to grant entry to foreign aid workers, who relief officials say are crucial to preventing more deaths from disease among an estimated 1.5 million victims of the May 3 storm.
In another blow to aid efforts, a ship carrying aid sank on the way from Yangon, the financial capital, to the Irrawaddy Delta, which bore the brunt of the storm.
The United Nations World Food Program said that only one visa had been approved out of 16 it had requested. The aid group World Vision said it had requested 20 visas and received two.
At Yangon's port, shipments of rice were being loaded onto two freighters bound for Malaysia and Singapore, apparently as part of an existing contract. Another ship was being loaded with rice bound for the delta.
Reuters reported Sunday that state-run Myanmar TV had said that 28,458 people had died in the cyclone and that 33,416 were missing.
Reuters also reported that the U.N. humanitarian agency had said in a new assessment that 1.2 million to 1.9 million people were struggling to survive in the aftermath of the storm. "The number of deaths could range from 63,290 to 101,682, and 220,000 people are reported to be missing," the U.N. Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.
Some water and electricity had been restored by Sunday in Yangon, but prices for rice and fuel had increased sharply, along with prices for candles while the power was out.
As aid shipments continued Sunday, a spokesman for the World Food Program, Paul Risley, said that they amounted to about one-tenth of what was needed and that the country also needed to start a major logistical operation to help victims of the storm.
The World Food Program said that the authorities had released 38 tons of high-energy biscuits it had confiscated Friday and that 4.4 tons of biscuits had been delivered Sunday. The International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said three of its aircraft had delivered 14 tons of shelter materials.
But the group said Sunday that a ship carrying aid for up to 1,000 people sank on the way from Yangon to the delta after apparently hitting a submerged tree trunk and taking on water, The Associated Press reported. Aung Kyaw Htut, who leads the Myanmar Red Cross distribution team, called the accident "a great loss for the Myanmar Red Cross and for the people who need aid so urgently." People near the village of Myinka Gone and aid workers managed to save some of the goods and started to carry them to the nearest town for onward shipment, the Red Cross said.
The United States was preparing to send in its first aircraft with relief supplies on Monday. Reuters reported that France was to deliver 1,500 tons of rice aboard the warship Mistral, which would arrive in the middle of this week.
The European Union urged the junta to allow more relief workers into the country, The AP reported. The EU development commissioner, Louis Michel, said Sunday that he welcomed signs of improving access for relief agencies that want to help the victims, but he warned that a massive international operation was still needed to save lives.
The focus of the military junta, meanwhile, was on its referendum for a constitution that was intended to perpetuate its rule. Many residents said the vote followed a campaign of coercion and propaganda.
The military appeared to have diverted some resources from helping cyclone victims to overseeing the voting, which was held in all but the hardest hit areas. A resident of Yangon said by telephone that refugees who had sought shelter in schoolhouses had been evicted so the sites could be used as polling places.
In Datgyigone, 55 kilometers, or 35 miles, north of Yangon, a precinct captain laughed when asked if he thought most people would vote for the constitution. "Everyone will vote yes," he said. "Of course yes. Hundred percent."
He said that most voters had no idea what they were voting for and that neither he nor most people he knew had actually read the proposed constitution. "The government says vote, so we vote," he said with a shrug. He spoke openly, but, fearing retribution, asked that his name not be used.
Most villagers, when asked about their votes, said nothing. A man selling batteries, combs and flip-flops from a pushcart hurried off when he was asked about the referendum. "I cannot speak about this," he said over his shoulder. "I'm afraid."
There were a number of reports of "pre-balloting," in which employees of companies or government offices were required to vote ahead of time under the eyes of their supervisors.
The product of a 14-year stop-and-start convention, the referendum is intended to lead to a multiparty election and a nominally civilian government. But it allots 25 percent of parliamentary seats to the military, gives it control of important ministries and allows it to seize control in a time of "emergency." It also would bar Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader whose party won a general election in 1990, from public office. She has been under house arrest for 12 of the last 18 years.
No preliminary results had been announced by late Sunday, but the state-run media said the voting had proceeded without incident. The front page of the government newspaper, The New Light of Myanmar, on Sunday carried photographs of General Than Shwe, the leader of the junta, voting with his wife, Kyaing Kyaing.
As the vote unfolded, relief officials warned of an epidemic of cholera and said there was generally a 10-day window after a disaster before the death rate rose steeply.
Health officials were concerned about the potential for cholera, typhoid and dysentery, which can be spread by contaminated water and food.
Severe diarrhea can be rapidly fatal, especially in children, and clean water and rehydrating solutions must be made available quickly to save lives.
While the generals were getting out the vote and relief workers were stranded abroad waiting for visas, the local staffs of international agencies were struggling with a disaster far beyond their capacities.
With limited stockpiled supplies and without the huge infrastructure needed for a relief operation of such a size, they were doing what they could, meeting each day to coordinate their work.
Unicef has one of the largest staffs in place, with 130 local workers and 17 foreigners. The World Food Program has 200 Burmese on staff and 15 foreigners. Most other staffs are tiny.
Shantha Bloemen, a spokeswoman for Unicef in Bangkok, said the first priorities were to gather stockpiled disaster relief food from around the country and to map the affected areas to determine what was needed.
At the same time, she said, Unicef was shopping at the local market for tarpaulins, plates and various first aid supplies. "The local markets are probably now depleted," she said.
Once the crisis of the lack of food, water, shelter and medical care are addressed, the next steps will be the rebuilding of lives and livelihoods.
The building blocks are rice, livestock and fisheries, said Diderik de Vleeschauwer, a spokesman for the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization. Two experts were in the field, he said, testing the salinity of the soil, the damage to rice stocks, the state of irrigation systems and the possibilities for draining vast pools of seawater deposited by the storm.
Many fishing boats have been lost, leaving survivors with no livelihood. Large numbers of animals are also thought to have died in a region that raises 40 per cent of Myanmar's livestock.
The effects of the cyclone will be felt for years.
"This is the food basket of the whole country," de Vleeschauwer said, "so damage to the crops and livestock and fisheries may affect seriously the food security situation of the entire country."
(A reporter for the International Herald Tribune in Myanmar wrote this article with Seth Mydans in Bangkok. Warren Hoge and Denise Grady contributed reporting from New York.)