UN suspends aid flights after Burma impounds food

By Rachel Stevenson, Julian Borger, Ian MacKinnon and agencies | The UN today suspended aid flights to Burma after emergency supplies for survivors of cyclone Nargis were impounded by the military government. A spokesman for the UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) said its food aid and equipment had been confiscated and flights could not resume until the situation was resolved.

“We’re going to have to shut down our very small airlift operation until we get guarantees from the authorities,” Tony Banbury, a WFP regional director, said.

The impounded food aid, totalling 38 tonnes of high-energy biscuits, was enough to feed 95,000 people.

“It should be on trucks headed to the victims. You’ve seen the conditions they are in. That food is now sitting on tarmac, doing no good,” Banbury added.

The impounding of the food aid came after the announcement of a ban on foreign aid workers entering Burma.

Burmese foreign ministry officials said the country would accept supplies from overseas but would control their distribution.

“Myanmar [Burma] is giving priority to receiving relief aid and distributing them to the storm-hit regions with its own resources,” the government-run New Light of Myanmar newspaper said.

“Myanmar is not in a position to receive rescue and information teams from
foreign countries at the moment.”

Frustration is mounting over Burma’s response to one of the worst disasters in its history.

A UN spokesman said the restrictions on foreign workers were “unprecedented” in the history of humanitarian work.

The Thai prime minister, Samak Sundaravej, cancelled a trip to meet members of the ruling military junta as delays in giving visas to aid workers and landing rights for relief flights continued.

A plane loaded with UN aid was allowed to land yesterday, but it represented only a fraction of what Burma needs. Two other planes have languished in Rangoon for two days.

Sundaravej had offered to undertake his own humanitarian mission to break the impasse. He has been in contact with the Burmese prime minister, Thein Sein, to ask that UN staff be allowed to distribute relief supplies.

However, he today said the visit now appeared futile, adding: “After they said today they would not welcome foreign staff, there is no point of me going there.”

The authorities yesterday turned back a plane carrying specialist disaster rescuers and aid. The UN secretary general, Ban Ki-moon, is still seeking talks with the junta.

The Burmese embassy in Thailand is now closed until Tuesday, putting any hopes of a climbdown on visas on hold until next week.

Villages have been submerged in the worst-hit Irrawaddy delta, and the UN now believes that more than 100,000 people have been killed.

Bodies are floating in the floodwater, and aid agencies warned that outbreaks of disease could result in the death toll increasing further.

With roads blocked, hundreds of thousands of survivors are beyond the reach of clean water, food and shelter.

Aid agencies said their expertise and experience in tackling similar disasters, such as the Asian tsunami in 2004, would help get emergency relief to the afflicted areas quickly.

Despite the disaster, the junta said it was pressing ahead with a vote on a new constitution designed to maintain its grip on power. All but the worst affected regions will be balloted tomorrow.

In a television message, citizens were urged to do their patriotic duty and vote. The message did not mention the suffering caused by the cyclone.

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