Myanmar generals still block humanitarian relief for cyclone

BANGKOK – Myanmar’s military government continued today to frustrate a large-scale humanitarian relief effort for the victims of last week’s cyclone, raising fears that disease could begin to affect untended victims and lead to an even higher death toll.

“If aid doesn’t start to go in right now, there is a significant risk of a second wave of deaths from disease,” said Richard Horsey, a spokesman for the U.N. Humanitarian Affairs Coordination Office in Bangkok.

But the country’s ruling generals continue to block most foreign aid workers from entering the country. They declared they would accept aid from abroad but no aid workers or the logistics equipment to deliver it.

The White House announced that the United States had received permission to land a C-130 cargo plane with relief supplies on Monday. But there was no indication yet whether U.S. aid workers would be able to supervise their distribution.

A small number of aid flights have landed in Yangon in recent days, ferrying supplies such as high-energy biscuits, but international officials say the amount falls drastically short of what is needed. The junta has deployed just seven helicopters to distribute the foreign aid, they said.

And aid agencies remain deeply uncomfortable with the junta’s demand that relief supplies be simply dropped off on the tarmac. Early today the U.N. World Food Program said it was suspending aid flights after it claimed the government confiscated deliveries from two cargo planes. The agency later announced it would resume flights Saturday.

But the government of Myanmar, also known as Burma, continued to balk at granting visas for foreign aid workers. The Myanmar Embassy in Bangkok, Thailand, where dozens of aid agencies have congregated as they seek permission to establish a humanitarian relief bridge, was closed today for a holiday. The embassy said it would reopen Monday.

Observers cited a variety of reasons for the regime turning a deaf ear to the help pounding on its door. They say the military rulers are chronically suspicious of Western motives and reluctant to have foreign humanitarian workers disperse across the country. Such images would clash with the military’s self-appointed role as the guardian of the nation, they said.

But the junta is also conducting a national referendum on a new constitution Saturday, a crucial step in what it sees as a way to legitimize its rule. The referendum was scheduled before Cyclone Nargis hit a week ago, killing at least 23,000 people and perhaps tens of thousands more. It will go forward as planned in all but the 47 worst-hit townships and Yangon, the capital, where voting has been pushed back two weeks.

“The regime is reluctant to let foreign aid workers in because it is in the middle of stage-managing the referendum that will allow it to cement military rule,” said Deborah Stothard, coordinator of the Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma, an umbrella group of human rights and pro-democracy organizations.

The generals say a constitution must be in place before elections scheduled for 2010 can be held, a key demand of Myanmar’s foreign critics. But for now, the critical fire is being trained on the junta’s handling of the cyclone aftermath, with accusations that the generals’ mismanagement could turn a natural disaster into a far greater human-made one.

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd called the generals’ stifling of a massive relief effort “appalling,” in a radio interview.

“The obscenity of this is that the people who pay the price are the poor Burmese people,” Rudd said.

 bruce.wallace@latimes.com