Nargis survivors face new perils

Yangon: The 1.5 million people left destitute by Cylone Nargis in Myanmar were increasingly desperate on Tuesday, as foreign aid remained at a trickle and overstretched aid workers struggled to reach hard-hit areas.

The slow relief work added to concerns about a tropical depression swirling southwest of Yangon and a US advisory that it could develop into a cyclone within 24 hours.

"It's terrible. This is always another worry when you have a major disaster, that you have further hazards affecting people," Amanda Pitt, spokeswoman for the UN's humanitarian affairs office, told a news conference in Bangkok.

However, the US advisory said conditions did not yet merit a full cyclone warning, while Tropical Storm Risk, which offers information on tropical storms for the insurance industry, among others, did not show tropical cyclone activity as of 0843 GMT.

Disease warning

Meanwhile, in a gesture to critics who say outside aid is critical, Myanmar's reclusive military rulers invited 160 personnel from neighbouring Bangladesh, China, India and Thailand to assist in delayed and sometimes chaotic relief efforts. But that is a fraction of the thousands of aid workers needed for a "tsunami-style" international aid operation.

"It's just awful. People are in just desperate need, begging as vehicles go past," Gordon Bacon, an emergency coordinator for the International Rescue Commtee, said from Yangon.

"If these people aren't reached and aid got to them quickly, and shelter and toilet facilities, disease will break out," Bacon said.

Thailand's Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej flew to Myanmar's main city of Yangon yesterday to try to persuade his counterpart Thein Sein to let more foreign experts into the pulverised areas.

Amid charges that urgent supplies may have been diverted, a World Food Programme spokesman in Bangkok said of high-energy food it had sent: "We collected the biscuits at the (Yangon) airport and they remain in our possession."