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KUNGYANGON, Myanmar, May 16 (Reuters)

The rows of beggars on either side of the road stretched for miles, twin columns of human misery left by the winds and waves of Cyclone Nargis.

Without clothes or shoes, the thousands of men, women and children made destitute by the cyclone could only stand in the mud and rain of the latest tropical downpour, their hands clasped together in supplication at the occasional passing aid vehicle.

Any car that did stop was mobbed by children, their grimy hands reaching through a window in search of bits of bread or a t-shirt.

The desperate entreaties expose the fragility of the claims by Myanmar's military government to be on top of the distribution of emergency relief in the worst-hit Irrawaddy delta, where up to 2.5 million people are now clinging to survival.

They also make all the more questionable the reclusive junta's refusal to admit large-scale foreign aid operations and the workers to run them.

That refusal is motivated by fear the operations might threaten the generals' grip on power in a country that has known only military rule for the last 46 years, critics say.

Aid volunteers were shocked by the roadside scenes, which suggest conditions in the delta are deteriorating rapidly with what little rice and food that could be salvaged from the ruins of inundated villages now running out.

"The situation has worsened in just two days. There weren't this many desperate people when we were last here," one relief volunteer said.

In the storm-struck town of Kunyangon, around 100 (60 miles) southwest of the former capital, Yangon, the situation was little better, even though the former Burma's military rulers have started distributing small amounts of emergency food there.

"I am one of the few survivors," said one lady in her 60s, who did not want to be named. "I came here to ask for some rice."

Her clothes -- a grubby grey top and faded black longgyi, or sarong -- are the same she wearing when the May 2 storm struck, sweeping away her home and possessions.

"I only survived by climbing a tree," she said.

Around the town, the countryside remains a mess of half-submerged trees, snapped electricity pylons or bamboo poles -- the skeletal remains of a house -- leaning at crazy angles.

Villagers say they are slowly burying the bloated corpses of friends and relatives that have littered the rice fields for the last two weeks. But the stench of death remains.

PRIVATE AID

Frustrated by the speed of the official response, ordinary people were taking matters into their own hands, sending trucks and vans into the delta with clothes, biscuits, dried noodles, and rice provided by private companies and individuals.

"There are too many people. We just cannot give enough. How can the government act as if nothing happened?" said one volunteer, who declined to be named for fear of reprisals.

Some said pro-regime thugs were even harassing volunteers in the western suburbs of Yangon.

Soldiers at military checkpoints leading out of the city were seizing digital cameras from aid volunteers to try to stop news leaking out to the outside world, others said.

With almost total distrust of the government, private aid is being left in the care of Buddhist monasteries, to be distributed by the monkhood, whose immense moral authority makes it the only institution capable of standing up to the military.

Going through the roll-call of the needy is a grim task.

"We need to give aid to this family," said one monk pointing to a list in a temple in one village.

"No," another monk beside him interjected. "They're all dead." (Writing by Ed Cropley; Editing by Jerry Norton)

Aids began to arrive in Yangon from international communities, but the
military personels took all of them with the army trucks and store in
their government buildings and storerooms. People in Yangon wonder if the
homeless civilians will ever get anything out of those aids through the
government.

The aids-group are not allowed by the Junta officers to stay in the land and
sadly returned at 9:15 am this morning.

Qatar Amiry 6 (VIP Flight a ni), A-310 had brought about 3 tons of the
Medical equipments with 62 doctors and journalists to Yangon Airport this
morning. The Junta officers refused their entry and help and told them to
leave.

The cyclone survivors in Yangon and around the province suffered much, and
the military government worsen their loss and sufferings. Do pray and help
in your possible means.

At least 351 killed in Myanmar cyclone (Asia Pacific News)

YANGON : At least 351 people were killed and nearly 100,000 left homeless when tropical cyclone Nargis tore through Myanmar, razing thousands of buildings and knocking out power lines, state media said Sunday.

Residents awoke Sunday to scenes of devastation after the cyclone bore through swathes of southern Myanmar late Friday and Saturday, uprooting trees, cutting phone lines and water pipes, and clogging streets with debris.

Myanmar's state channel MRTV said on their Sunday evening news broadcast that 109 people had been killed in Haing Gyi island, just off the coast of southwestern Ayeyawaddy division where the storm first hit.

One person was killed in Nyaung Done, a township also in Ayeyawaddy, the channel reported.

An information ministry official and state media had already reported that another 222 people had died in Ayeyawaddy, while 19 others were killed in the economic hub Yangon.

The authorities have declared disaster zones in the regions of Yangon, Ayeyawaddy, Bago, Mon and Karen states.

MRTV said that about 20,000 houses have been destroyed on Haing Gyi island, and 92,706 people there were now homeless.

In one mainland township in Ayeyawaddy, 75 percent of all homes were believed to be destroyed, the channel said, adding that authorities had launched a rescue operation in the region.

Nargis made landfall late Friday around the mouth of the Ayeyawaddy (Irrawaddy) river, about 220 kilometres (137 miles) southwest of Yangon, before hitting the country's economic hub.

The cyclone brought down power and phone lines, cutting off the military-run nation one week before a crucial referendum on its new constitution -- the first polling in Myanmar since general elections in 1990.

The coastal area of Ayeyawaddy appears worst hit by the natural disaster, but Yangon was also battered.

Traffic lights, billboards and street lamps littered the roads after being knocked over by strong winds.

Trees in the leafy city were uprooted, crushing buildings and cars, while water pipes were also cut, forcing people out onto the streets with buckets to try and buy water from the few shops that remained open.

Roofs of houses have been torn away, while only a few taxis and buses -- which tripled their fares -- braved the debris-clogged streets on Sunday.

The information ministry official said seven empty boats had sunk in the country's main port, while Yangon's international airport was closed.

State media said the airport was due to reopen on Monday.

"Now the military and police have started to clean the city," the official said. "We are trying to get back to the normal situation as soon as possible."

Electricity supplies and telecommunications in Yangon have been cut since late Friday night as the storm bore down from the Bay of Bengal, packing winds of 190-240 kilometres (120-150 miles) per hour.

There are also fears that the poorer outlying areas of Yangon, with their flimsy houses, might have been hard hit.

"A tea shop owner told me that many people in a Yangon suburb need urgent help for food and accommodation," one food vendor said. "Some children are not even wearing clothes."

Myanmar's infrastructure has been run into the ground by decades of mismanagement by the military, which has ruled since 1962.

It was not immediately known whether damage from the storm would affect next Saturday's referendum on a new constitution, which the ruling military says will pave the way for democratic elections in 2010.

Critics, however, say the charter will simply enshrine the military's power.

Residents in Yangon said they had heard speculation that the referendum might be postponed, but the information ministry official refused to comment.

"We cannot say anything, it is up to the senior authorities," he said.

Thailand's meteorological department downgraded Nargis to a depression on Sunday, but warned of flash floods and heavy rains in northern, central and eastern Thai provinces as the storm crept over the border from Myanmar.

An official at Thailand's disaster prevention department told AFP that as of Sunday evening, there were no reports of severe flooding in the kingdom.

- AFP /ls

Healing Burma

From the Boston Globe

May 7, 2008

YANGON, Myanmar—Hungry people swarmed the few open shops and fistfights broke out over food and water in Myanmar's swamped Irrawaddy delta Wednesday as a top U.S. diplomat warned that the death toll from a devastating cyclone could top 100,000.

The minutes of a U.N. aid meeting obtained by The Associated Press, meanwhile, revealed the military junta's visa restrictions were hampering international relief efforts.

Only a handful of U.N. aid workers had been let into the impoverished Southeast Asian country, which the government has kept isolated for five decades to maintain its iron-fisted control. The U.S. and other countries rushed supplies to the region, but most of it was being held outside Myanmar while awaiting the junta's permission to deliver it.

Entire villages in the Irrawaddy delta were still submerged from Saturday's storm, and bloated corpses could be seen stuck in the mangroves. Some survivors stripped clothes off the dead. People wailed as they described the horror of the torrent swept ashore by the cyclone.

"I don't know what happened to my wife and young children," said Phan Maung, 55, who held onto a coconut tree until the water level dropped. By then his family was gone.

A spokesman for the U.N. Children's Fund said its staff in Myanmar reported seeing many people huddled in rude shelters and children who had lost their parents.

"There's widespread devastation. Buildings and health centers are flattened and bloated dead animals are floating around, which is an alarm for spreading disease. These are massive and horrific scenes," Patrick McCormick said at UNICEF offices in New York.

Myanmar's state media said Cyclone Nargis killed at least 22,980 people and left 42,119 missing.

American diplomat Shari Villarosa, who heads the U.S. Embassy in Yangon, said the number of dead could eventually exceed 100,000 because safe food and water were scarce and unsanitary conditions widespread.

The situation is "increasingly horrendous," she said in a telephone call to reporters. "There is a very real risk of disease outbreaks."

Myanmar's state television Thursday showed Prime Minister Lt. Gen. Thein Sein distributing food packages to the sick and injured in the delta and soldiers dropping food over villages. The date of the distributions was not given.

A few shops reopened Wednesday in the Irrawaddy delta, but they were quickly overwhelmed by desperate people, said Paul Risley, a spokesman for the U.N. World Food Program in Bangkok, Thailand, quoting his agency's workers in the area.

"Fistfights are breaking out," he said.

A Yangon resident who returned to the city from the delta area said people were drinking coconut water because there was no safe drinking water. He said many people were on boats using blankets as sails.

Local aid groups distributed rice porridge, which people collected in dirty plastic shopping bags, he said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he feared getting into trouble with authorities for talking to a foreign news agency.