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Myanmar crisis 'could kill 1.5m'
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SCI-TECH
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By Agencies
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![Myanmar's military government has pressed on with a constitutional referendum [AFP]](http://mwcnews.net/images/stories/Asia/A/B/1/2/3/4/5/6/Myanmar-military.jpg "Myanmar's military government has pressed on with a constitutional referendum [AFP]") | | Myanmar's military government has pressed on with a constitutional referendum [AFP] |
Up to 1.5 million cyclone survivors in Myanmar could die if clean water and sanitation are not provided to them, an international aid organisation has said.
An Oxfam official said the toll from the May 3 cyclone could eventually be 15 times higher than their latest estimate of 100,000.
"In the Boxing Day tsunami [of 2005] 250,000 people lost their lives in the first few hours, but we did not see an outbreak of disease because the host governments and the world mobilised a massive aid effort to prevent it from happening," Sarah Ireland, Oxfam's regional chief, said.
"We have to do the same for the people of Myanmar."
The UN Refugee Agency and the International Red Cross have flown supplies into Myanmar, but only a quarter of people affected by the cyclone have received any form of aid.
Myanmar's military government has so far limited the flow of relief supplies into the country, saying it would prefer to distribute any aid itself.
Vote overshadowed
Myanmar's government has in the meanwhile pushed ahead with a controversial referendum despite international appeals for the ruling military to focus on relief efforts.
The referendum got under way on Saturday in much of the north and far south of the country, although in the areas hardest hit by Cyclone Nargis the vote has been postponed for two weeks.
Some 27 million of Myanmar's 57 million people were eligible to vote, although it was unclear how many voted on Saturday and how many will vote on May 24 instead.
But the cyclone has overshadowed the vote, which even before the disaster many saw as being skewed in the military's favour.
According to state-run Myanmar television, a week after the storm hit the death toll stands at 23,335, with 37,019 missing - both figures only slightly changed since Tuesday.
However Western diplomats in Yangon, Myanmar's former capital, say up to 100,000 people may have been killed by Cyclone Nargis, while more than one million have been left without shelter.
Many are without food and clean water.
Myanmar's government has refused to allow foreign relief workers into the country to direct relief efforts.
Humanitarian officials are still waiting for visas a week after the cyclone struck.
State-run TV news repeated broadcasts urging people to vote, making no mention of the tens of thousands killed and missing in the cyclone.
"Those who value the national well-being should go and vote 'yes'," MRTV said in a scrolling headline.
The UN has called on Myanmar's government to focus instead on delivering aid to the 1.5 million cyclone victims who face disease and hunger and on Friday made a "flash appeal" for $187m to provide aid over a six month period. ![The referendum has been delayed in areas hardest-hit by the cyclone [AFP]](http://mwcnews.net/images/stories/Asia/A/B/1/2/3/4/5/6/Myanmar-effort-2.jpg "The referendum has been delayed in areas hardest-hit by the cyclone [AFP]") | | The referendum has been delayed in areas hardest-hit by the cyclone [AFP] |
The draft constitution guarantees 25 per cent of parliamentary seats to the military and allows the president to hand over all power to the military in a state of emergency.
The rules would also bar Aung San Suu Kyi, the detained leader of the country's pro-democracy movement, from public office.
Her National League for Democracy (NLD) party won a general election in 1990 but their victory was ignored by the military.
Anti-government groups and human rights groups, which have criticised the charter as designed to perpetuate military rule, have accused the government of neglecting cyclone victims to advance its own political agenda.
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