Thousands cyclone victims may never be identified

TENS of thousands of people killed in last month’s Burmese cyclone may never be identified because their bodies have decomposed so badly and many ended up far from home, an aid organisation said yesterday.

The task of burying an estimated 78,000 bodies has been overshadowed by efforts to assist Cyclone Nargis’ 2.4 million survivors, many of whom are still without adequate food, water and shelter, the International Committee of the Red Cross said.

As a result, bloated bodies still litter the Irrawaddy delta more than five weeks after the storm, while other bodies have been dumped in canals or unmarked mass graves.

“Many are in advanced stages of decay and the information we have been able to gather is that many of the bodies affected by the tidal surges were stripped of clothing and any identifying items,” said Craig Strathern, a Red Cross spokesman.

The Red Cross last week began distributing kits to volunteers that include body bags, forms to list where a body is buried, and any details identifying it, but Mr Strathern said he doubted there would be any large-scale effort to identify victims, mostly because Burmese law allows families to declare someone dead after three weeks.

“We’re certainly not aware of any initiatives that try to achieve positive identification of bodies,” he said. “I don’t know what the reason would be. If there is not a demand from the families or legal imperative in the system, it’s not going to achieve too much.”

Survivors in the delta said they tried to identify bodies but were overwhelmed by the numbers of dead clogging rivers and washing up on beaches.

“Initially, the bodies were identified by relatives and we cremated them after holding religious rights,” said Myint Thuang, a survivor from the delta town of Bogalay. “However, after more bodies washed up on the shore and with no one to identify them, we buried them in mass graves.”

The situation differs from the 2004 tsunami that killed nearly 230,000 people. In worst-hit Banda Aceh, Indonesia, collecting and identifying bodies was a top priority, driven largely by Muslim tradition that calls for burying the dead within the first day.

With only six UN helicopters and seven from the Burmese government, relief supplies are mostly being transported along dirt roads and by boat. International aid agencies say boats able to navigate the delta’s canals are scarce and efforts to import vehicles have been hampered by red tape.

The government has dismissed complaints that survivors are not being reached with aid and reports that they have been forced from camps and dumped near their devastated villages. It said survivors have a choice to remain in the camps or return home with government help.

“It is a storm of rumours designed to deal a devastating blow to our country,” according to local newspaper commentary at the weekend.