UN chief's pledge on Burma relief

Posted in: World News on Wed 21st May

United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon has promised to do his "utmost" to help cyclone victims in Burma, ahead of his visit to the military-ruled nation.

Mr Ban, due in Burma on Thursday to tour storm-hit areas, said relief work had reached a "critical moment".

The UN says that less than a quarter of the 2.4 million people affected by Cyclone Nargis have received aid.

It says relief efforts must be scaled up to avoid more deaths - and wants more foreign experts to be allowed in.

The death toll from the cyclone stands at 78,000 dead, with another 56,000 missing. Hundreds of thousands of people have lost their homes.

Some aid is getting in, but almost three week on from the storm, relief work is still being hampered by the Burmese government's reluctance to accept large-scale foreign help.

'Scaled up'

Ahead of his departure, Mr Ban said he wanted to see for himself the situation on the ground.

"I want to see the conditions under which relief teams are working, and I intend to do all I can to reinforce their efforts, in co-ordination with the Myanmar [Burma] authorities and international aid agencies," he told reporters at UN headquarters in New York.

He welcomed some signs of flexibility from the junta, including its decision to accept relief workers from the 10-member Association of South East Asian Nations (Asean).

He said the UN had received permission for nine World Food Programme helicopters to operate in remote areas.

"I believe further similar moves will follow, including expediting the visas of [foreign] relief workers seeking to enter the country," he said.

"I'm confident that emergency relief efforts can be scaled up quickly."

'Access needed'

Mr Ban touches down in Thailand on Wednesday and then flies to Burma early on Thursday morning.

It is not yet clear whether he will meet Burma's top leader, Gen Than Shwe.

The UN chief will then hold talks in Bangkok before returning to Burma on Sunday for a donor conference in its commercial capital, Rangoon.

Some countries have welcomed the conference, which was agreed on Monday at an emergency Asean meeting in Singapore.

But the US envoy to Asean, Scot Marciel, questioned its relevance.

"Without an adequate and independent assessment of the situation and current needs, as well as a commitment by the regime to provide the necessary access, a pledging conference is unlikely to produce the results we seek," he told a congressional hearing.

On Wednesday, Burmese state media appeared to rule out accepting aid ferried by US navy ships and helicopters off its coast, saying it would come "with strings attached".

But Mr Marciel said the junta was clearly not capable of managing the logistics for such a massive relief effort.

"The situation on the ground is increasingly desperate and the regime's failure to provide greater access to the international community to the affected area is putting hundreds of thousands of lives at risk."

The UN says that tens of thousands of people are living in more than 200 temporary camps across the region.

Health centres and schools have been wiped out and while food aid is getting in, it has still not reached some of the remotest areas.

Three days of mourning are currently under way in Burma for the cyclone victims.

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