Published May 13, 2008 07:01 am - YANGON, Myanmar — The United Nations said Tuesday that only a tiny portion of international aid needed for Myanmar’s cyclone victims is making it into the country, amid reports that the military regime is hoarding good-quality foreign aid for itself and doling out rotten food.
7 a.m.: UN: Myanmar regime hoarding aid
YANGON, Myanmar — The United Nations said Tuesday that only a tiny portion of international aid needed for Myanmar’s cyclone victims is making it into the country, amid reports that the military regime is hoarding good-quality foreign aid for itself and doling out rotten food.
The country’s isolated military regime has agreed to accept relief shipments from the U.N. and foreign countries, but has largely refused entry to aidworkers who might distribute the aid.
Two U.S. planes have already delivered aid to the country, and, in an apparent broadening of the initial agreement, the government seemed willing to allow future shipments.
But logistical bottlenecks, poor infrastructure and the junta’s restrictions have delayed the distribution of the aid, which is piling up at the airport in Yangon.
“There is obviously still a lot of frustration that this aid effort hasn’t picked up pace” 10 days after the cyclone hit, said Richard Horsey, the spokesman of the U.N. humanitarian operation in Bangkok, Thailand.
Cyclone Nargis devastated the country’s Irrawaddy delta on May 3, leaving about 62,000 people dead or missing, according to the government count. The U.N. has suggested the death toll is likely to be more than 100,000.
With their homes washed away and large tracts of land under water, some 2 million survivors — mostly poor rice farmers — are living in abject misery, facing disease and starvation.
The U.N. said the World Food Program is only getting in 20 percent of the food needed.
“That is a characterization of the program as a whole. We are not reaching enough people quickly enough,” Horsey told The Associated Press.
The survivors are packed into Buddhist monasteries or camped in the open, drinking dirty water contaminated by dead bodies and animal carcasses. Food and medicines are scarce.
The military — which has ruled the country with an iron fist since 1962 — has taken control of most aid sent by other countries including the United States.
The regime told a U.S. military commander who delivered the first American shipment on Monday that basic needs of the storm victims are being fulfilled and “skillful humanitarian workers are not necessary.”
But the junta’s words and actions have only served to back up complaints that the military is appropriating the aid for itself.
A longtime foreign resident in Yangon told the AP in Bangkok that angry government officials have complained to him about the misappropriation of the aid by the military.
He said the officials told him that quantities of the high-energy biscuits rushed into Myanmar by the WFP on its first flights were sent to a military warehouse.