Myanmar junta belittles foreign aid, calls it handouts of 'chocolate bars'

Yangon: Myanmar's ruling junta lashed out at foreign aid donors on Friday, saying cyclone victims did not need their supplies of "chocolate bars" and could instead survive by eating frogs and fish.

The Myanma Ahlin newspaper, a government mouthpiece, blasted donors for pledging just 150 million dollars so far for survivors of the devastating storm, saying the country needed 11 billion dollars.

"People from the Irrawaddy delta can survive on their own, even without bars of chocolate donated by the international community," it said, adding they can live on "fresh vegetables that grow wild in the fields and on protein-rich fish from the rivers."

The reference to chocolate bars appeared to be metaphorical. No aid agency is known to be distributing chocolate, which would be impractical in the country's tropical heat.

The World Food Programme gives rice, beans and special high-energy biscuits designed to provide nutrition to people without regular food supplies.

"Myanmar people are capable enough of rising from such natural disasters even if they are not provided with international assistance," the newspaper reported.

"Myanmar people can easily get fish for dishes by just fishing in the fields and ditches," the paper said. "In the early monsoon, large edible frogs are abundant."

Meanwhile, aid groups complained on Friday that Myanmar's military government was still hindering the free flow of international help for victims of Cyclone Nargis, while the junta belittled those efforts.

Some foreign aid staff are still waiting for permission to enter the hardest-hit Irrawaddy delta while the regime continues to review entry requests for 48 hours, the groups said. Some 2.4 million are homeless and hungry after the May 2-3 cyclone hit Myanmar, also known as Burma.

"The Burmese government is still using red tape to obstruct some relief efforts when it should accept all aid immediately and unconditionally," the US-based Human Rights Watch said in a statement.

The International Red Cross was waiting for permission to send 30 of its foreign staffers into the delta.

The regime has also barred naval vessels from the United States, France and Great Britain, which were poised offshore with humanitarian supplies, from entering Myanmar's waters.

The French have been forced to dock in Thailand and turn over the relief goods to the United Nations for onward shipment into Myanmar.

"By still delaying and hampering aid efforts... the generals are showing that, even during a disaster, oppression rules," Human Rights Watch said.

The isolationist government only agreed to allow foreign aid workers in after UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon met with leader Senior Gen. Than Shwe last weekend.

The United Nations estimates that about one million people in the worst-hit Irrawaddy Delta are still without emergency aid.

The country's xenophobic leaders are leery of foreign aid workers and international agencies, worrying they could weakened the junta's powerful grip. The generals also don't want their people to see aid coming directly from countries like the US, which the regime has long treated as a hostile power.