Burma 'forcing cyclone refugees from camps'

Burma’s cyclone victims are being forced from refugee camps and dumped near their wrecked homes without aid or supplies, the UN said today.

Charity workers fear the country’s brutal ruling junta is worried about encouraging dependency among the millions displaced.

Eight camps set up earlier by the government for homeless victims in the Irrawaddy delta town of Bogale were “totally empty” as the clear-out continued, Unicef official Teh Tai Ring said.

“The government is moving people unannounced,” he said, adding that authorities were “dumping people in the approximate location of the villages, basically with nothing.”

Camps were also being closed in Labutta, another town in the delta, a low-lying area that took the brunt of Cyclone Nargis nearly a month ago.

Centralising stricken people in the centres had made it easier for aid agencies to deliver emergency relief since many villages in the delta can only be reached by boat or over very rough roads.

Aid workers who have reached some of the remote villages say little remains that could sustain the former residents. Houses are destroyed, livestock have perished and food stocks have virtually run out. Medicines are non-existent.

The Unicef official said some of the refugees were “being given rations and then they are forced to move.” But others were being denied such aid because they had lost their government identity cards, he said.

There was speculation that authorities did not want “a refugee mentality” to set in, with camp inmates dependent on aid for a long period of time.

Aid groups say Burma’s military government is still hindering foreign assistance for victims of the cyclone, while the junta has belittled the aid efforts as mere handouts of chocolate bars.

Foreign aid workers are still awaiting visas, and the government is taking 48 hours to process requests to enter the Irrawaddy delta, the groups said.

They said the International Red Cross was waiting for permission to send 30 foreign staff into the delta.

An estimated 2.4 million people remain homeless and hungry after the May 2-3 cyclone hit Burma. The government says the storm killed 78,000 people and left another 56,000 missing.

“The Burmese government is still using red tape to obstruct some relief efforts when it should accept all aid immediately and unconditionally,” U.S.-based Human Rights Watch said.

“By still delaying and hampering aid efforts ... the generals are showing that, even during a disaster, oppression rules,” it said.

The junta has also barred naval ships from the United States, France and Great Britain, which were poised offshore with humanitarian supplies. The French have been forced to dock in Thailand and turn over relief goods to the United Nations for shipment into Burma.

While welcoming millions of dollars from the international community for cyclone relief, Burma attacked donors for not pledging enough.

The Myanma Ahlin newspaper, a government mouthpiece, said in any case cyclone victims could get by without foreign handouts.

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