Voting continues as Burma agrees to more aid workers

Published on Saturday 24 May 2008 20:17

DISASTER relief officials said there was "no time to lose" to help Burma's cyclone survivors after the secretive military government promised the United Nations it would allow in more aid workers.

The junta, criticised for stalling a full-blown aid effort for 2.4 million people left destitute by Cyclone Nargis three weeks ago, went ahead yesterday with a referendum on an army-drafted constitution in cyclone-devastated areas.

Turnout was low in the Irrawaddy delta and areas in and around the former capital, Rangoon, hit hard by the storm which left 134,000 people dead or missing. In an apparent breakthrough to ramp up the international aid effort, junta leader Senior General Than Shwe assured UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Friday that Burma would allow in aid experts "of all nationalities".

"We have no more time to lose, so it's imperative that the authorities immediately provide the international community with the practical details of the agreement," European Union aid chief Louis Michel said.

Ban, who met Than Shwe in his isolated new capital of Naypyidaw, 250 miles north of Rangoon, said afterward he hoped the deal on aid experts "can produce results quickly".

A 39-year-old Burmese aid worker who returned from abroad to help with the aid effort, was sceptical. "I'm worried that the government is going to tighten the regulations later on because they think they have given in enough," she said.

In Rangoon yesterday, queues at polling stations were thin as many residents had voted in advance, officials said. Detained opposition leader and Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi was allowed to vote on Friday at her home where she is under house arrest.

However, yesterday's vote will have little impact on the final result of the referendum. The charter, which critics say will entrench military rule, won 92.4% approval in a first-round vote on May 10 in parts of the country unscathed by the cyclone.

One voter said she voted "No" despite a government campaign pressing Burma's 53 million people to back the charter as part of a "roadmap to democracy" leading to elections in 2010. "I just want them to know that despite everything that they have tried to do, there are still people who will not accept them," the woman said.

In the run-up to today's donor pledging conference, UN officials and foreign diplomats were taken on a tour of the devastated delta. Those present included International Development Secretary Douglas Alexander, who yesterday travelled to Thailand for talks with Ban.

Burma has said it needs more than $11bn (5.5bn) in pledges from the meeting jointly organised by the United Nations and Association of South-east Asian Nations, which includes Burma as one of its 10 members. Some 60 countries, UN agencies and other bodies will be represented at the conference.

Meanwhile, the cyclone damage to the Irrawaddy delta has caused a surge in looting in its restive border areas by poorly paid troops worried about food shortages. In the north-west town of Kalaymo, which is reliant on the faraway delta for much of its rice and salt, local residents said soldiers were seizing rice, fish and firewood.

In the evenings, soldiers were stopping villagers at checkpoints on their way back from the market and taking their cash, often out of fear their pay of 12 a month will be diverted to the cyclone-hit areas.