Burma cyclone kills 10,000 in one town

May 6, 2008 - 12:27PM
Source: ABC

Very few soldiers were seen clearing debris and trees, except at major intersections, Rangoon residents said. Photo: AFP

Countries worldwide promised help to Burma after a cyclone killed 10,000 people in just one town, suggesting the overall death toll in the impoverished military-run South-East Asian nation will be much higher.

"In Irrawaddy division the death toll amounts to more than 10,000," said Tuesday morning's Burma TV broadcast.

"The missing is about 3,000. In Bogalay, the death toll is about 10,000."

In the biggest city, Rangoon, people were queuing up to share bottled water and there was still no electricity, four days after the vicious Cyclone Nargis struck the Irrawaddy delta, rice bowl for the country's 53 million people.

"Generators are selling very well under the generals," said one man waiting outside a shop, reflecting some of the resentment on the streets to what many described as a slow warning and response to the cyclone's 190 kilometre per hour winds.

An Australian man staying with family in Rangoon when the cyclone hit says when he left Rangoon for Sydney last night it was almost unrecognisable.

"Everything was just torn apart, it doesn't look like a city any more, I even got lost going from one place to another," he said.

Very few soldiers were seen clearing debris and trees, except at major intersections, residents in the former capital said. Monks and residents, using what tools they had, cut trees.

"The regime has lost a golden opportunity to send the soldiers as soon as the storm stopped to win the heart and soul of people," a retired civil servant said.

Burma officials, after an initial count of a few hundred dead, announced dramatically higher tolls in meetings with international aid agencies and diplomats.

"The basic message was that they believe the provisional death toll was about 10,000 with 3,000 missing," a Rangoon-based diplomat told Reuters in Bangkok, summarising a briefing from Foreign Minister Nyan Win before the report on the 10,000 dead in one town.

Aid accepted

The last major storm to ravage Asia was Cyclone Sidr, which killed 3,300 people in Bangladesh last November.

The scale of the disaster drew a rare acceptance of outside help from the diplomatically isolated generals, who spurned such approaches in the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.

Australia is standing by to contribute to the international aid effort with World Vision Australia given the go ahead to provide assistance with the short term focus being on shelter, food and water purifiers.

After getting a "careful green light" from the government, the United Nations said it was pulling out all the stops to send in emergency aid such as food, clean water, blankets and plastic sheeting.

"The UN will begin preparing assistance now to be delivered and transported to Burma as quickly as possible," World Food Program (WFP) spokesman Paul Risley said.

The UN office in Rangoon said there was an urgent need for plastic sheeting, water purification tablets, cooking equipment, mosquito nets, health kits and food.

- Reuters