Burma still struggling 40 days after cyclone
Updated
Hundreds of thousands of people remain in desperate need in Burma, nearly five weeks after Cyclone Nargis devastated the southern delta region. Two weeks ago UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said he'd been given assurances by Rangoon that all foreign aid workers would be allowed in. But the military government has kept tight controls on the movement of foreign aid, leaving grassroots workers doing their best to fill the gaps.
Presenter: Bo Hill
Speakers: Craig Strathern, spokesman, International Committee for the Red Cross in Myanmar; Aung Myat Kyaw, chairman, Myanmar Marketing Committee, Myanmar Tourism Promotion Board
HILL: 40 days after Cyclone Nargis the military government is allowing more foreign aid workers in to help with the relief effort. The UN says "reasonable" numbers of its staff are getting through, but not at a level it would like. Craig Strathern from the International Committee for the Red Cross in Myanmar says the doors are starting to open.
STRATHERN: In the past week we have been fortunate enough to have a number of our own staff - both locally employed and expatriate - visit certain areas so we're now building up a much better picture of what the real needs are.
HILL: For many international agencies, it has taken a long time to get access to the worst affected areas. While UN helicopters were able to deliver supplies this week, aid from other international sources, especially from the United States, has been turned down by the Burmese regime. And while overseas aid is struggling to get through, Craig Strathern says the Burmese are looking after their own.
STRATHERN: It's true that in this particular operation local NGOs and community groups, businesses and individuals have played a very significant role in bringing first relief to the affected areas.
HILL: Aung Myat Kyaw is the head of one such relief effort supported by a group of tourism and hotel companies from around Burma. He's just come back from three weeks in the Pyapone district, where he and 20 others distributed 5000 packages of rice, dahl, salt, mosquito nets and blankets to cyclone victims. He says he wasn't prepared for what he saw.
AUNG: Oh! Devastation everywhere. Sad, very sad. In the villages in the Pyapone district, the death toll is not that high - it's around 20 per village, but not as high as other villages where almost entire villages were gone. But the destruction is total.
HILL: It took Aung Myat Kyaw two days to get out of his own house in Rangoon after the storm hit and brought down surrounding trees. He says, however, it was nothing compared to what was happening in the south.
AUNG: Food was a problem two, three days after the cyclone because they panicked, nothing was left. So what they were doing was they were eating coconut and drinking coconut juice, that's how they were surviving and there was a sunny day two, three days after the storm so they managed to dry the rice that was left. That allowed them to eat for 10 days, two weeks. But thank god there were other private organisations, private Burmese, they were coming and they were giving it.
HILL: Burmese without government or NGO affiliations are making weekend trips to help out.
AUNG: Usually people come from Yangon on a day trip - Saturday and Sundays are packed with people coming from Yangon. It's a solidarity you know, we share things, sorrow, so we try to help.
HILL: The next step for Aung Myat Kyaw's group is to start building temporary schools for elementary students who were due to start school last week. He says while the communities outside of the delta region have pulled together, so have those who have lost so much.
AUNG: It's amazing - they are together and they were asking only what they needed. They were not greedy because they know everyone is suffering.
HILL: 40 days after Cyclone Nargis the military government is allowing more foreign aid workers in to help with the relief effort. The UN says "reasonable" numbers of its staff are getting through, but not at a level it would like. Craig Strathern from the International Committee for the Red Cross in Myanmar says the doors are starting to open.
STRATHERN: In the past week we have been fortunate enough to have a number of our own staff - both locally employed and expatriate - visit certain areas so we're now building up a much better picture of what the real needs are.
HILL: For many international agencies, it has taken a long time to get access to the worst affected areas. While UN helicopters were able to deliver supplies this week, aid from other international sources, especially from the United States, has been turned down by the Burmese regime. And while overseas aid is struggling to get through, Craig Strathern says the Burmese are looking after their own.
STRATHERN: It's true that in this particular operation local NGOs and community groups, businesses and individuals have played a very significant role in bringing first relief to the affected areas.
HILL: Aung Myat Kyaw is the head of one such relief effort supported by a group of tourism and hotel companies from around Burma. He's just come back from three weeks in the Pyapone district, where he and 20 others distributed 5000 packages of rice, dahl, salt, mosquito nets and blankets to cyclone victims. He says he wasn't prepared for what he saw.
AUNG: Oh! Devastation everywhere. Sad, very sad. In the villages in the Pyapone district, the death toll is not that high - it's around 20 per village, but not as high as other villages where almost entire villages were gone. But the destruction is total.
HILL: It took Aung Myat Kyaw two days to get out of his own house in Rangoon after the storm hit and brought down surrounding trees. He says, however, it was nothing compared to what was happening in the south.
AUNG: Food was a problem two, three days after the cyclone because they panicked, nothing was left. So what they were doing was they were eating coconut and drinking coconut juice, that's how they were surviving and there was a sunny day two, three days after the storm so they managed to dry the rice that was left. That allowed them to eat for 10 days, two weeks. But thank god there were other private organisations, private Burmese, they were coming and they were giving it.
HILL: Burmese without government or NGO affiliations are making weekend trips to help out.
AUNG: Usually people come from Yangon on a day trip - Saturday and Sundays are packed with people coming from Yangon. It's a solidarity you know, we share things, sorrow, so we try to help.
HILL: The next step for Aung Myat Kyaw's group is to start building temporary schools for elementary students who were due to start school last week. He says while the communities outside of the delta region have pulled together, so have those who have lost so much.
AUNG: It's amazing - they are together and they were asking only what they needed. They were not greedy because they know everyone is suffering.
