John Holmes, Under-Secretary-General, Humanitarian Affairs, United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator, has expressed disappointment at the inadequate progress made in gaining access into Myanmar, where Cyclone Nargis has left tens of thousands of people dead and hundreds of thousands homeless, without food, drinking water, medical attention and medicines. Holmes described the current situation as “increasingly desperate.”
Holmes said “There’s a real danger that an even worse tragedy may unfold if we cannot get the aid that’s desperately needed in quickly.” He did say slight progress was made in gaining access to Myanmar, but the visa situation for relief workers and the products they bring with them is tragically slow. “Frustrations have been growing that this humanitarian response is being held back because of difficulties of access in different ways,” he said, noting that many visas are still pending.
Holmes explained that two UNDAC (UN Disaster Assessment and Coordination) members are now in Yangon, but two others have not been let in for “for reasons which we are still trying to establish.”
Although agreements seemed to have been reached with authorities regarding the waiver of custom charges and clearance for aid delivery, whether this is fully operational on the ground remains to be seen.
“I do appeal very strongly indeed to the Government of Myanmar both to step up their own relief efforts to help people on the ground and to change their attitude completely to the efforts that we are making to get these relief supplies in,” said Holmes.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is trying to talk to Than Swe, Senior General, Myanmar, to urge him to make access possible for aid workers and supplies. Mr. Ban says he has been “urging the authorities of Myanmar to be flexible in opening their boundaries” so that relief workers can get in. “I am concerned that if we lose time at this very critical time, then many more people will die because of this crisis.”
Despite the devastation caused by Cyclone Nargis, the Government of Myanmar says a May 10th constitutional referendum will still go ahead – it will be postponed just in the most affected areas. Responding to this, Mr. Ban’s spokesman said “Due to the scope of the disaster facing Myanmar today, however, the Secretary-General believes that it may be prudent to focus instead on mobilizing all available resources and capacity for the emergency response efforts.”
The World Food Programme has managed to get four flights loaded with much needed relief supplies into Yangon on Thursday. There are now over 40 tons of high-energy biscuits on the ground in Yangon. These will be distributed as soon as possible.
UNICEF (The UN Children’s Fund) is sending 3 million water purification tablets – this can provide 200,000 people with clean water for a whole week. Emergency supplies have been pre-positioned, including enough family health kits for 155,000 people.
UNDP (the UN Development Programme) has sent rotating teams of national staff to four of the affected townships to make disaster assessments, deliver relief items and provide support to the population UNDP serves. UNDP is the only UN agency located in the Irrawaddy Delta.
Reports from various media, such as the BBC and CNN, say that getting around in Myanmar is extremely difficult and often impossible. Bridges are down, roads are totally wrecked and obliterated in many areas. Getting past officious and unhelpful soldiers is perilous.
It has been four days since the disaster struck. As in any event of this scale, getting help out immediately to people who need it is crucial in order to keep the number of injuries and deaths down to a minimum. Thousands of people in stricken areas have seen nobody since Cyclone Nargis destroyed their homes. If help does not come straight away the tragedy becomes much worse very quickly.
A BBC reporter in Myanmar wrote that a man stood next to his wrecked house and wondered why there were no soldiers this time, if last time when there were demonstrations against the government they were all over the place.
Written by – Christian Nordqvist