YANGON, Myanmar -- In one town, tired and hungry refugees stood in the baking sun beside flooded rice paddies, demolished monasteries and thatched huts. With the arrival of each vehicle carrying precious food and water, they jumped with excitement and surged ahead to get a share.
They were among the lucky ones -- aid was actually coming.
In this photo supplied by Malteser International, cyclone survivors smile after receiving boxes of supplies in Labutta, Myanmar. But observers say in many outlying areas, aid has yet to reach victims more than two weeks after the storm.
"The further you go, the worse the situation," said an overwhelmed doctor in the town of Twante, just southwest of Yangon, Myanmar's main city. "Near Yangon, people are getting a lot of help and it's still bad. In the remote delta villages, we don't even want to imagine."
Despite signs everywhere to the contrary, Myanmar's military government tried Saturday to show the world that all was under control, leading diplomats on their first tour through the Irrawaddy delta, where more than 130,000 people were killed or are still missing after the May 2-3 cyclone.
The junta flew 60 diplomats and United Nations officials in helicopters to three places in the delta where camps, aid and survivors were put on display.
Authorities said they have almost finished carrying out relief work and are moving toward reconstruction and rebuilding. The underlying message was that they welcome international assistance but there is no need for foreign personnel.
The diplomats were not all swayed.
"It was a show," Shari Villarosa, the top U.S. diplomat in Myanmar, told The AP by telephone after returning to Yangon. "That's what they wanted us to see."
State-run radio said the government has so far spent 20 billion kyat, or about $2 million, for relief work and has received millions of dollars in relief supplies from local and international donors.
The radio reported that the government was distributing assistance promptly and efficiently. But a French navy ship that arrived Saturday off Myanmar's shores loaded with food, medication and fresh water -- a potentially lifesaving cargo -- was given the now familiar red light, a response which France's UN ambassador, Jean-Maurice Ripert, called "nonsense."
"We have small boats, which could allow us to go through the delta to most of the regions where no one has accessed yet," he said. "We have small helicopters to drop food, and we have doctors."
A Canadian military plane carrying 40 tonnes of relief supplies arrived in the Thai capital Bangkok on Saturday.
The Canadian Red Cross said the aid will broken up into smaller shipments and taken to Yangon where it will be distributed by local Red Cross volunteers on the ground.
The USS Essex, an amphibious American assault ship, and its battle group have been waiting to join in the relief effort as well. U.S. marine flights to Yangon from their makeshift headquarters in Utapao, Thailand, continued Saturday but negotiations to allow helicopters to fly directly to the disaster zone were stalled.
Myanmar's state-run television, which has repeatedly broadcast footage of generals reassuring refugees calmly sitting in clean tents, announced Friday that the death toll from Cyclone Nargis had nearly doubled to 78,000 with about 56,000 missing.
Aid groups say even those estimates are low.
According to the international Red Cross, the death toll alone is probably about 128,000, with many more deaths possible from disease and starvation unless help gets quickly to some 2.5 million survivors of the disaster.
Access to regular supplies of safe drinking water and proper sanitation is essential for preventing waterborne diseases like cholera. Malaria and dengue fever outbreaks also will be a major concern in the coming weeks after mosquitoes have time to breed in the stagnant water.
-- AP / CP
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