The EU aid chief said yesterday that Myanmar’s junta still would not budge on accepting foreign relief workers, two weeks after the cyclone tragedy that has left 77,738 dead and 55,917 missing.
Heavy rains again pounded the devastated southern Irrawaddy Delta region, compounding the misery for many of the estimated 2.5 million people in need of immediate food, water, shelter or medical care.
The junta’s refusal to allow in expert teams to help oversee the massive relief effort since the May 2 to May 3 storm has angered the international community, which has nevertheless been sending in hundreds of tonnes of supplies.
Louis Michel, the EU’s humanitarian aid commissioner, was due to leave the secretive nation later in the day after failing to get permission to visit the delta, which has been all but sealed off to journalists and outsiders.
He said the regime, which has long been suspicious of the outside world and any influence which could weaken its control on power, would not explain why they refused to issue visas for disaster emergency experts.
“They didn’t answer the question, and they did not give any reason,” Michel said.
Western diplomats who declined to be named said the regime was taking them to the delta today, but have no further details about where they would be going.
Michel said he had been taken to “a rather perfect, organized camp” outside the main city of Yangon, far from the flooded and devastated delta region where aid groups say many survivors have still not received help.
Amid a report from the WHO that there are cases of cholera in the delta, a reporter who managed to reach the region spoke to a man who said his wife died in the storm’s aftermath.
Ohn Kyi, 57, said his wife perished after spending two nights — cold, wet and hungry — clinging to an embankment in the rain.
“She had no warm clothes to change into,” he said. “She survived the storm, but she could not recover from the cold.”
As state media raised the official death toll to 43,318, with nearly 28,000 still missing, Myanmar’s Southeast Asian neighbors geared up for talks in Singapore on Monday aimed at convening a high-level donors meeting.
A UN source said a donor meeting would likely take place in Southeast Asia, probably Bangkok, with next Saturday suggested as a possible date.
The junta has said that the country will welcome aid shipments but has steadfastly refused to bow to international pressure to let in most outside workers, saying it can manage the disaster on its own.
US President Donald Trump yesterday announced sweeping "reciprocal tariffs" on US trading partners, including a 32 percent tax on goods from Taiwan that is set to take effect on Wednesday. At a Rose Garden event, Trump declared a 10 percent baseline tax on imports from all countries, with the White House saying it would take effect on Saturday. Countries with larger trade surpluses with the US would face higher duties beginning on Wednesday, including Taiwan (32 percent), China (34 percent), Japan (24 percent), South Korea (25 percent), Vietnam (46 percent) and Thailand (36 percent). Canada and Mexico, the two largest US trading
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
RSS