By David Blair and Thomas Bell
Last Updated: 8:37PM BST 19/05/2008
An international relief operation designed to help victims of Burma's cyclone, exploiting loopholes in the regime's ban on Western aid, should begin soon, Britain said.
Lord Malloch-Brown, the Foreign Office minister responsible for Asia, returned to London after visiting Burma and neighbouring countries. A relief effort led by the Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean), in co-operation with the UN, had been agreed, he said.
"It was clear that the Burmese had more confidence in their Asian neighbours than they did in a Western-directed operation," said Lord Malloch-Brown.
Aid from Western countries will go to Burma's neighbours, from where it will be transferred to the devastated areas of the Irrawaddy Delta.
This "Asean-UN" approach was the "best show in town and we're putting our eggs in that basket," said the minister. But he added: "We can't afford to have this snagged up in Burmese delays."
If this method failed, Lord Malloch-Brown said that other options remained open.
Western aid agencies and Burma's military regime hold diametrically opposing views on the scale of the crisis. Foreign relief workers think that between 1.5 million and two million people need help – and only 500,000 are being reached at present.
But Lord Malloch-Brown said that when he met Burmese ministers "their insistence was 'what crisis? All the emergency needs are met and what we need from the Asean nations is assistance for the recovery phase'."
The minister said this was a "panglossian view", adding that a "needs assessment" should be completed before a donors' meeting on Monday.
Meanwhile, Burma's generals have followed China and belatedly announced three days of national mourning. General Than Shwe, the junta leader, appeared on television for the first time since the cyclone struck. State radio boasted that the regime had spent £1 million on aid.
got this from here.
Cyclone Nargis
May the generations learn how to protect from the disaster...
May the generations learn how to work together as Burmese
Citizens, as we do now for the Cyclone Nargis's relief.
May the generations know the world is with us..........
May the generations know the darkness can't overcome the Light....
May the generations realize that they are part of history......
May the sky of Burma free from darkness cloud.
We shall not forget this sadness movement.
** You can almost find ever thing here and here about Cyclone Nargis relief works.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Myanmar cyclone: plan to beat Burmese block on Western aid
Monday, May 19, 2008
Myanmar Agrees to Allow Aid Efforts by Neighbors
BANGKOK — Myanmar agreed Monday to let its Southeast Asian neighbors help coordinate foreign relief assistance for cyclone victims, bending to international pressure to allow in some more outside aid, Singapore’s foreign minister, George Yeo, said.
“We will establish a mechanism so that aid from all over the world can flow into Myanmar,” Mr. Yeo said, speaking at an emergency meeting in Singapore of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or Asean, which includes Myanmar.
“Myanmar is also prepared to accept the expertise of international and regional agencies to help in its rehabilitation efforts,” he told a news conference.
But he said the entry of aid workers from countries outside the Southeast Asian bloc would continue to be limited. “We have to look at specific needs — there will not be uncontrolled access,” Mr. Yeo said.
Since the cyclone, Western nations and major relief groups have raised alarm about Myanmar’s refusal to allow in large-scale relief shipments to the estimated 2.5 million survivors in need of aid after of the May 3 cyclone.
Myanmar has permitted a small flow of aid from several nations, including the United States, but relief officials say that this amounts to only 20 percent of the needed supplies. Without more aid, they say, many more people may die of disease and starvation.
Myanmar’s limited concession Monday came as international pressure continued to build from several directions, with the French foreign minister, Bernard Kouchner, warning that the junta could be guilty of “crimes against humanity” if it continued to restrict the supply of aid into the country.
However, despite the international criticism, Myanmar’s foreign minister, Nyan Win, was quoted by Reuters as telling reporters that there had been no delay in accepting aid. “We always welcomed international aid,” he said.
After failing to receive a reply to letters and telephone calls made to the military junta, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon was due to travel to Yangon this week in hopes of meeting the country’s leader, Senior Gen. Than Shwe.
More than two weeks after the cyclone, General Shwe emerged from the isolated capital, Naypyidaw, and was shown on Myanmar state media for the first time in public Monday, meeting ministers involved in the rescue effort and touring some affected areas. In addition, the government announced that a three-day mourning period for the cyclone’s victims would begin Tuesday, The Associated Press reported. State television announced that the national flag would be flown at half-mast, beginning at 9 a.m.
State-run television showed General Shwe visiting a refugee camp, checking supplies, patting the heads of babies and shaking hands with survivors. Some of the cyclone victims, surrounded by neat rows of blue tents, clasped their hands and bowed as the general and other senior military officials walked by.
While accepting a limited amount of help, the government has insisted that it can handle the disaster on its own. The televised images were part of a broad propaganda campaign by the government to show its citizens and the outside world that it is in control of the situation.
Mr. Ban has called for a “high-level pledging conference” to deal with the crisis and for cooperation between the United Nations and Southeast Asian countries in overseeing aid delivery.
Mr. Yeo said that Asean would work with the United Nations to hold such a conference in Yangon on May 25 to coordinate aid deliveries. He said that Myanmar had agreed to allow in medical teams from any of its nine neighbors in Asean. Thailand has already sent a contingent of more than 30 medical workers.
In addition, Myanmar has allowed in 50 medical workers from India. China’s Xinhua news agency reported that a team of 50 Chinese medics arrived in Yangon Sunday night.
Mr. Yeo said the Myanmar government estimates losses at $10 billion in the cyclone, which swept through the Irrawaddy Delta and the country’s main city, Yangon, early on the morning of May 3.
Myanmar has raised its official death toll to 78,000.
Representatives of United Nations relief agencies said that some of their supplies were getting into Myanmar but that the authorities were still severely limiting delivery and withholding many visas from foreign relief experts.
The United Nations World Food Program said it had managed to deliver food aid to just 212,000 of the 750,000 people it thinks are most in need.
The United Nations and France have naval vessels just outside Myanmar’s territorial waters, and are prepared to deliver supplies directly to affected areas along the coast, but they have not received clearance from the government.
In a column in the French daily Le Monde, Bernard Kouchner, the French foreign minister, said the United Nations should intervene by force, or be guilty of cowardice in the eyes of the world.
“What we need to bring is hand-to-hand, heart-to-heart help, not donor conferences with all their bowing and scraping,” he said in an interview with French radio. “In the meantime, people are dying.”
Mr. Yeo rejected the idea of delivery by force. “That will create unnecessary complication,” he said at the news conference. “It will only lead to more suffering for Myanmar people.”
On Saturday, Myanmar’s powerful neighbor and ally, China, said that other countries must show “due respect” to Myanmar in its handling of the disaster within its borders.
“Myanmar is a sovereign country,” said Wang Baodong, a spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, at a briefing. “In the end, rescue and relief work will have to rely on the Myanmar government and people.”
Seth Mydans reported from Bangkok and Alan Cowell from Paris.
Got it from here.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Starvation warning for Myanmar's children
YANGON, Myanmar (AP) -- Thousands of children in Myanmar will starve to death in two to three weeks unless food is rushed to them, an aid agency warned Sunday as an increasingly angry international community pleaded for approval to mount an all-out effort to help cyclone survivors.
art.survivor.
A cyclone survivor reacts after receiving donated clothing and sheets in Myanmar's capital, Yangon.
The United Nations said Myanmar's isolationist ruling generals were even forbidding the import of communications equipment, hampering already difficult contact among relief agencies.
A U.N. situation report said Saturday that emergency relief from the international community had reached an estimated 500,000 people. But the regime insists it will handle distribution to victims of Cyclone Nargis.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who has been unable to sway Myanmar's leaders by telephone, said he was sending U.N. humanitarian chief John Holmes to Myanmar this weekend.
Holmes was expected to arrive Sunday evening in Myanmar's largest city, Yangon, said Amanda Pitt, a U.N. spokeswoman in Bangkok, the capital of neighboring Thailand.
"He's going at the request of the secretary-general to find out what's really going on the ground, to get a much better picture of how the response is going and ... to see how much we can help them scale up this response," Pitt said. Details of the visit, she said, were still being worked out.
The U.N. report said all communications equipment used by foreign agencies must be purchased through Myanmar's Ministry of Posts and Communications -- with a maximum of 10 telephones per agency -- for US$1,500 (euro960) each. Importing equipment is not allowed.
State-run radio said the government has so far spent 20 billion kyat (about US$2 million; euro1.3 million) for relief work and has received millions of dollars (euros) worth of relief supplies from local and international donors. It said the government was distributing assistance promptly and efficiently to the affected areas.
Aid agencies were not convinced.
Save the Children, a global aid agency, said Sunday that thousands of young children face starvation without quick food aid.
"We are extremely worried that many children in the affected areas are now suffering from severe acute malnourishment, the most serious level of hunger," said Jasmine Whitbread, who heads the agency's operation in Britain. "When people reach this stage, they can die in a matter of days."
International outrage mounted over Myanmar's handling of the disaster.
Britain's prime minister accused authorities in the country, also known as Burma, of preventing foreign aid from reaching victims and said the military regime cares more about its own survival than it's people's welfare.
"This is inhuman," Gordon Brown told the British Broadcasting Corp.
In one town near Yangon, tired and hungry refugees stood in the baking sun beside flooded rice paddies, demolished monasteries and thatched huts. With the arrival of each vehicle carrying precious food and water, they jumped with excitement and surged ahead to get a share. Video Watch villagers struggle to find food, clothing »
At least they were getting something.
"The farther you go, the worse the situation," said an overwhelmed doctor in the town of Twante, just southwest of Yangon, Myanmar's main city. "Near Yangon, people are getting a lot of help and it's still bad. In the remote delta villages, we don't even want to imagine." The doctor declined to give her name, fearing government reprisal.
The government flew 60 diplomats and U.S. officials in helicopters to three places in the Irrawaddy delta, the hardest-hit area, on Saturday to show them progress in the relief effort.
The diplomats were not all swayed.
"It was a show," Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar, told The Associated Press by telephone after returning to Yangon. "That's what they wanted us to see." Video Watch an analyst compare Myanmar's disaster response to China »
A French navy ship that arrived Saturday off Myanmar's shores loaded with food, medication and fresh water -- a potentially lifesaving cargo -- was given the now-familiar red light. France's U.N. ambassador, Jean-Maurice Ripert, called it "nonsense."
"We have small boats, which could allow us to go through the delta to most of the regions where no one has accessed yet," he said. "We have small helicopters to drop food, and we have doctors."
The USS Essex, an amphibious assault ship, and its battle group also have been waiting to join the relief effort. U.S. Marine flights to Yangon from their makeshift headquarters in Utapao, Thailand, continued Saturday -- bringing the total to 500,000 pounds of aid delivered -- but negotiations to allow helicopters to fly directly to the disaster zone were stalled.
Myanmar's state-run television, which has repeatedly broadcast footage of generals reassuring refugees calmly sitting in clean tents, announced Friday that the cyclone death toll had nearly doubled to 78,000 with about 56,000 missing.
Aid groups say even those estimates are low.
The international Red Cross says the death toll alone is probably about 128,000, with many more deaths possible from disease and starvation unless help gets quickly to some 2.5 million survivors.
But seeing that help gets to the victims does not appear to be a top priority for Myanmar's rulers. The military, which took power in a 1962 coup, has even barred foreigners from traveling outside of Yangon, putting up a security cordon around the city. Myanmar has been slightly more open to aid from its neighbors, accepting Thai and Indian medical teams, which arrived Saturday. The 32-member Thai team was expected to travel to the delta in the coming days, said Dr. Surachet Satitniramai, director of Thailand's National Medical Emergency Services Institute.
The Indian team consists of 50 doctors and paramedics from the Army Medical Corp., said Indian Air Force spokesman Wing Cmdr. Manish Gandhi. He could not immediately say if they would be allowed to go to the delta.
I got this from here.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
As cyclone refugees wait, Myanmar refuses aid
YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — Myanmar's junta kept a French navy ship laden with aid waiting outside its maritime border on Saturday, and showed off neatly laid out state relief camps to diplomats.
The stage-managed tour appeared aimed at countering global criticism of the junta's failure to provide for survivors of Cyclone Nargis, which left at least 134,000 people dead or missing.
The junta flew 60 diplomats and U.N. officials in helicopters to three places in the Irrawaddy delta where camps, aid and survivors were put on display. The diplomats were not swayed.
"It was a show," Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar, told The Associated Press by telephone after returning to Yangon. "That's what they wanted us to see."
The relief group Save the Children UK warned that thousands of children could die of starvation within two or three weeks unless more aid gets into the country quickly.
"With hundreds of thousands of people still not receiving aid many of these children will not survive much longer," the charity said in a statement. "Children may already be dying as a result of a lack of food."
Meanwhile, a French navy ship that arrived Saturday off Myanmar's shores loaded with food, medication and fresh water was given the now familiar red light, a response that France's U.N. ambassador, Jean-Maurice Ripert, called "nonsense."
"We have small boats which could allow us to go through the delta to most of the regions where no one has accessed yet," he said a day earlier at U.N. headquarters. "We have small helicopters to drop food, and we have doctors."
The USS Essex, an amphibious assault ship, and its battle group have been waiting to join in the relief effort as well. U.S. Marine flights from their makeshift headquarters in Utapao, Thailand, continued Saturday — bringing the total to 500,000 pounds of aid delivered — but negotiations to allow helicopters to fly directly to the disaster zone were stalled.
Britain's prime minister accused authorities in Myanmar of behaving inhumanely by preventing foreign aid from reaching victims, and said the country's regime cares more about its own survival than the welfare of its people.
"This is inhuman," Gordon Brown told the British Broadcasting Corp. in his strongest criticism yet of Myanmar's authoritarian government.
Brown said a natural disaster "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."
Britain's Ministry of Defense said it had dispatched a Royal Navy frigate to the area "as a contingency." The HMS Westminster broke away from an exercise with the French and Indian navies, a ministry spokesman said, speaking anonymously in line with military policy.
The spokesman said the ship carried a crew of 98 and was equipped with a communications facility, a Merlin helicopter, two sea boats, a doctor and a paramedic. The spokesman added that crew members are all trained in disaster relief.
Myanmar's media, which has repeatedly broadcast footage of generals reassuring refugees calmly sitting in clean tents, announced Friday that the death toll from Cyclone Nargis had nearly doubled to 78,000 with about 56,000 missing.
Aid groups say even those estimates are low.
According to the international Red Cross, the death toll alone is probably about 128,000, with many more deaths possible from disease and starvation unless help gets quickly to some 2.5 million survivors of the disaster.
But seeing that help gets to the victims is not the first priority of Myanmar's rulers. The military, which took power in a 1962 coup, says all aid must be delivered to the government for distribution and has barred foreigners from leaving Yangon, putting up a security cordon around the country's main city.
Myanmar has been slightly more open to aid from its neighbors.
It has accepted Thai and Indian medical teams, which arrived in Yangon on Saturday. The 32-member Thai team was expected to travel to the delta in the coming days, said Dr. Surachet Satitniramai, director of Thailand's National Medical Emergency Services Institute.
The Indian team consists of 50 doctors and paramedics from the Army Medical Corp., said Indian Air Force spokesman Wing Cmdr. Manish Gandhi. He could not immediately say if they will be allowed to go to the delta.
With the monsoon season coming, Myanmar was bracing for a long haul ahead.
Though patches of hot sun broke through Saturday, heavy rains since the cyclone have hampered relief efforts. Despite the overabundance of water in the flooded delta, shortages of water that is fresh enough to drink grew more severe by the day.
Access to regular supplies of safe drinking water and proper sanitation is essential for preventing waterborne diseases like cholera. Malaria and dengue fever outbreaks also will be a major concern in the coming weeks after mosquitoes have time to breed in the stagnant water.
In one town, tired and hungry refugees stood in the baking sun beside flooded rice paddies, demolished monasteries and thatched huts awaiting food and water. With the arrival of each vehicle carrying precious supplies, they jumped with excitement and surged ahead to get a share.
They were among the lucky ones — aid was actually coming.
"The further you go, the worse the situation," said an overwhelmed doctor in the town of Twante, just southwest of the country's largest city, Yangon, helping a locally organized relief effort there.
"Near Yangon, people are getting a lot of help and it's still bad," said the doctor, who refused to give her name for fear of being punished by the regime. "In the remote delta villages, we don't even want to imagine."
Myanmar gov't keeping out aid for cyclone victims
By The Associated Press
YANGON - Despite signs everywhere to the contrary, Myanmar's military government tried yesterday to show the world that all was under control, leading diplomats on their first tour through the Irrawaddy Delta, where more than 130,000 people were killed or are still missing after the May 2-3 cyclone.
The junta flew 60 diplomats and United Nations officials in helicopters to three places in the delta where camps, aid and survivors were put on display.
Authorities said they have almost finished carrying out relief work and are moving toward reconstruction and rebuilding.
The underlying message was that they welcome international assistance but there is no need for foreign personnel.
The diplomats were not all swayed.
"It was a show," Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar, told the AP by telephone after returning to Yangon. "That's what they wanted us to see."
A French navy ship that arrived yesterday off Myanmar's shores loaded with food, medication and fresh water - a potentially lifesaving cargo - was given the now familiar red light, a response which France's UN ambassador, Jean-Maurice Ripert, called nonsense.
"We have small boats, which could allow us to go through the delta to most of the regions where no one has accessed yet," he said.
The USS Essex, an amphibious assault ship, and its battle group have been waiting to join in the relief effort as well.
U.S. Marine flights to Yangon from their makeshift headquarters in Utapao, Thailand, continued yesterday - bringing the total to 500,000 pounds of aid delivered - but negotiations to allow helicopters to fly directly to the disaster zone were stalled.
According to the International Red Cross, the death toll alone is probably about 128,000, with many more deaths possible from disease and starvation unless help gets quickly to some 2.5 million survivors of the disaster.
But seeing that help gets to the victims does not appear to be the first priority of Myanmar's rulers.
The military, which took power in a 1962 coup, says all aid must be delivered to the government for distribution and has barred foreigners from leaving Yangon, putting up a security cordon around the country's main city.
got it from here.
Karel Vervoort: Air drops work. Burma needs them now
A proven method of releasing small, life-saving parcels can bring instant relief to the junta's neglected people, if the will is there
Sunday, 18 May 2008
It is 15 days since Cyclone Nargis hit Burma's Irrawaddy delta. Officially, 78,000 people have died (with another 55,000 missing), but NGOs estimate the figures will go a good deal higher yet. The UN admits it hasn't a clue how bad things are. Offers of help for the 2.5 million people affected have come from all over the world, and aid organisations have done their valiant best to bring assistance. The situation is dire. There is nothing more certain than that corpses lying around in stagnant water will give rise to disease, yet that is precisely what the few images we have been allowed to see have shown us.
Yesterday, one account, from 60 miles south of the capital, reported the dispossessed lining the road: "Without clothes or shoes, the thousands of men, women and children could only stand in the mud and rain of the latest tropical downpour, their hands clasped together in supplication at the occasional passing aid vehicle. Any car that did stop was mobbed by children, their grimy hands reaching through a window in search of bits of bread or a T-shirt." A Burmese volunteer commented: "The situation has worsened in just two days. There weren't this many desperate people when we were last here." Yet the backward-looking junta in Rangoon will accept aid only on its own terms, refusing to allow foreign humanitarian workers into the country and insisting – despite having little experience – on distributing aid itself. This is not mere protection of national sovereignty but, when thousands are dying as a direct result, a paranoia-inspired crime against humanity.
So what are we in the comfortable West to do? Either we can ignore the problem, an option made easier for our politicians by a comparative lack of public pressure (thanks to the media being largely shut out of Burma). Or our governments can press on, cynically or otherwise, seeking to persuade the Burmese government that we mean them no harm and only want to help, a state of affairs that has produced monotonously unchanging news bulletins for 10 days. Or we can be a great deal more proactive, and do something that might help the image of international interventionism, so damaged by the Iraq adventure. A more muscular approach might involve, say, air drops of food and other supplies.
Should we do it, and would it work? To the "should we?" question, the answer is almost certainly yes. Admittedly, without prior approval from the Burmese government, we would be invading its airspace, something not to be undertaken lightly. Would the (insufficient) aid that is getting through on the ground be cut off in retaliation? Would foreign planes be shot at by the military? Would the Chinese get drawn in, with the possibility of a quite unpredictable escalation? I will return to these concerns below. But the "should we?" question is answered by reference to the New York declaration in September 2005, marking the 60th anniversary of the United Nations. There it says that the international community, through the UN, "has the responsibility to use appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means to help protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity". This "responsibility to protect", surely, makes the case unambiguously. The UN, as we know, is notoriously bad at reaching agreement, but the principle stands.
So to the question "would it work?" There are problems, admittedly, but none of them insurmountable. Dropping large quantities of anything at random can be ineffective, as well as dangerous to those on the ground. Aid can fall into the wrong hands – either black marketeers or those with military muscle.
But there is a way of distributing aid from the air in small packages and across a wide area that overcomes these problems. It allows individual parcels, weighing up to 5kg, to be scattered widely, minimising the chances of them being monopolised and misused. The idea is to provide survival packs, containing enough food, water, anti-malaria pills and water purification tablets to keep one person alive for one day.
Fifteen years ago, I gave a presentation in London on what I and my personal staff were doing within Nato to develop ways of using military assets in international disaster relief. I showed videos on the low-altitude bulk food gravity drop system that we were then using in Africa in the Belgian air force. At that meeting, a man called Geoff Woodford told me he had been thinking about another system of air-dropping food without parachutes, which he called Snowdrop. He told me that he had done initial tests in South Africa using C130 planes. Having seen a video of these tests, I immediately saw that his system would complement the one we had been using in the Belgian air force. He and I came to an agreement whereby we would develop the system together, without our paying him for the patent. There were a good few teething problems, but we carried on, anxious to find a way of dropping aid on top of people, on top of houses, without causing damage, even in complex emergencies. After 10 years of tests and investment, we had perfected a way of doing it. By 2003 it was declared "operational" in the Belgian air force by the Minister of Defence, and we had developed a system that could be used with any aircraft with a back door. It can drop from any altitude. We did it up to 12,000 feet, but it can be done up to 24,000 or even higher, provided there is oxygen for the crew. It can be done by stealth, at night.
The question is, why has Snowdrop (in which, I should say, I have no financial interest) not been used in Burma? In theory, if the food arsenals were in place, aid could have been dropped within 24 hours of the cyclone. One stumbling block is the lack of political will. We have been reluctant to offend the Burmese government, preferring the softly, softly approach of trying to persuade it to change its stripes. This morning, though, Gordon Brown said an air drop could not be ruled out, although the British would have precious few C130s available and have no experience with Snowdrop as perfected by the Belgians. Ludicrously and scandalously, there has been a dispute over the ownership of the patent. The United Nations World Food Programme began implementing its own Snowdrop programme, declaring on their website that they had devised the system themselves.
But herein lies the problem. Geoff Woodford subsequently filed a complaint insisting that the patent was his, and asserting ownership of the intellectual property. I know whose side I am on. Since then there has been an impasse. A highly effective system exists that should now be in use in Burma. Many actual "experts" do not even know of its existence. When John Holmes, the UN's humanitarian affairs officer, meets Burmese officials this week, the idea of such a drop should be on the table. Nobody doubts that aid is best provided with the collaboration of the host government, but a form of it can be given even without that co-operation. There is even a half-way house. A deal could be done with Rangoon to allow officials to fly on board the planes, as happened when we did a drop in Ethiopia. A member of the military checked everything that went on board, everything that was dropped, and knew exactly where we were flying. That would allay fears of military or covert action, and satisfy the Chinese. With imagination, these things can be done. We don't have to sit on our hands.
Major General Karel Vervoort is a former head of Training and Support Command in the Belgian Air Force
I got it from here.
