Burma: Cyclone Nargis: one year on, six jailed for burying the dead

[Mid]

Burma: Cyclone Nargis: one year on, six jailed for burying the dead
Posted: 04 May 2009

One year after Cyclone Nargis devastated Burma, six people have been jailed by the authorities for helping to bury victims while another 15 remain behind bars for their relief efforts. Amnesty International calls on the Burmese government to release these prisoners of conscience immediately and without condition.

The six - Dr Nay Win and his daughter Phyo Phyo Aung, Aung Kyaw San, Lin Htet Naing (aka Aung Thant Zin Oo), Phone Pyeit Kywe and Shein Yazar Tun - were arrested by Military Affairs Security in mid-June 2008 following their efforts to bury cyclone victims in Bogale Township in the devastated Irrawaddy Delta in southern Burma. They were sentenced on 10 April 2009 to prison terms ranging from two to four years.

Since the cyclone hit, Burmese people from all walks of life have been working together to distribute aid from private donors in order to rebuild the devastated areas. Among them is the popular comedian Zarganar. He is serving a 35-year prison sentence for leading a private donor movement that emerged in the aftermath of the cyclone.

Benjamin Zawacki, Amnesty International's Burma researcher, said:
'This is an untold story behind the cyclone. At the same time as relief efforts have moved forward, the Burmese government has penalised people for assisting.

'The authorities should immediately release these 21 people, who are among the over 2,100 political prisoners in Burma.

'One year on, when we mark the first anniversary of Nargis, we should not forget those prisoners who are serving long sentences for trying to help their fellow Burmese. Indirectly they have also become victims of the cyclone.'

Amnesty International has called on the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to urge the Burmese government, an ASEAN member, to free those who were imprisoned.

As the driving force behind the massive relief efforts - that also included the Burmese government and the United Nations - ASEAN has a duty to ensure that people delivering aid can do so without fear of intimidation or arrest.

Background:

Cyclone Nargis hit Burma on 2-3 May 2008. The natural disaster soon evolved into a humanitarian and human rights crisis when for three weeks the Burma government rejected international assistance to provide the necessary relief effort. More than 84,500 people died, tens of thousands are still missing, and some 2.4 million had their homes destroyed or were otherwise affected.

Seven of the 21 people who are in detention for their cyclone relief activities are being held in prisons far from their homes. Political prisoners are now increasingly liable to being moved to remote locations. Their families must undertake long journeys to visit them, sometimes up to nine days. Because of the poor conditions and inadequate medical care in Burma's prisons, political prisoners often rely on their families to provide them with basic medicines, food and clothing.

Zarganar was arrested on 4 June 2008, after he criticised the government's handling of the cyclone relief situation in interviews with the foreign media. Zarganar, an activist and a dentist by training who joined the 1988 uprising against military rule, had been previously arrested for his pro-democracy efforts. He is currently in poor health and is being denied proper medical attention.

Amnesty International also calls on the Burmese government not to torture or otherwise ill-treat these prisoners of conscience at any time. The prison authorities should also provide them with all necessary medical treatment for any health problems that they have.

amnesty.org.uk

[The Gentleman Scamp]

Asian atrocity is blatant and shameless whilst western atrocity is hoodwinking and misleading and terrified of a revolution.

Either way we really need to be wiped out be a meteorite asap.

[Mid]

Either way we really need to be wiped out be a meteorite asap.

ease up scampy

[blackgang]

ease up scampy

Didn't you see that Movie,, he thinks he is Dustin Hoffman.

[Rural Surin]

ease up scampy

Didn't you see that Movie,, he thinks he is Dustin Hoffman.

Rainman?

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Two Years after Nargis, Life Is Far from Normal
MON MON MYAT
Saturday, May 1, 2010

BOGALAY, Burma — Kyaw Moe is just in his 30s, but he is already on his second shot at life—just like the rest of the residents of Thakan Ngu, a tiny Burmese village in this township of Bogalay.

On May 2, 2008, Kyaw Moe lost his wife and two children in the midst of Cyclone Nargis, which slammed with all its Category 3 might through the Irrawaddy Delta and the southern part of the Rangoon Division. By the time the skies cleared and the winds stopped blowing, Thakan Ngu—some six hours by car and boat ride from the former capital Rangoon—had about half of its population of nearly 300 either missing or dead.


Villagers including children volunteer for making sandbags to make embankment in Thaunglay Village in Cyclone Nargis-hit Delta, bracing for monsoon season which starts in late April. Burma's state-owned media has quoted the warning of the Meteorological Department and has alerted the people living in the delta to brace a storm that might happen this early monsoon season.
(Photo: AP)

Estimates by foreign aid organizations put Nargis’s total fatalities in Burma at some 140,000 while the United Nations says 2.4 million people were affected by the cyclone. Total amount of damage and losses reached US$ 4.05 billion, according the Post-Nargis Joint Assessment (PONJA) report of the United Nations, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), and the Burmese government.

International aid agencies have since been trying to help Nargis’ survivors recover from the tragedy. For instance, some 1.1 million Burmese have been given food aid in the two years after Nargis, says the UN Assistance by groups like the Myanmar Red Cross, World Vision, and the Paris-based Gret have also enabled people like Kyaw Moe continue to till land for a living.

But Nargis’s devastation was too great to make for a quick and simple recovery. Complicating matters is the changing weather that has had farmers at a loss over what they can do to save their harvests and earn some money for their families.

"We have not recovered yet because farm yield is in decline," says Kyaw Moe, who with his siblings works on a 11.33-hectare collective farmland. He points to other factors that have hindered their progress: "This year, rats destroyed about two to three acres (.81 to 1.21 hectares) and farming cost has increased."

Fellow farmer Win Soe, meanwhile, is steeling himself for a nearly empty wallet after harvest. To plant rice on his land, he had taken out a loan from a rice mill owner at a 50-percent interest, plus a promise that he would sell his harvest to the lender at a price set by the latter. But he now expects a yield that is much less than he has hoped for.

"We knew it was going to be a big burden," says Win Soe of the loan and arrangement he has made for his crop. "But we had no choice as we needed the money to plant and harvest."

Conceded Thierry Delbrevue, head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA) here: "It is something that is less understood by the donors…. Livelihood is one of the most critical sectors actually, maybe after shelter."

A 2007 survey by the government and UN agencies had indicated that up to 60 percent of the families in the delta were engaged in agriculture. In Thakan Ngu, more than 20 of the 50 families are into farming while the rest are casual laborers who rely on seasonal work such as fishing or helping raise livestock or poultry.

To be sure, after Nargis, rice farmers who owned land less than six hectares were given seeds, fertilizer, and diesel for two farming cycles. Power tillers were provided for sharing among five to six farmers.

But these proved inadequate for them to have harvests as good as they had before the cyclone rampaged through their fields in 2008. The Post-Nargis Periodic Review III Tripartite Core Group (TCG) of the UN, Asean, and the Burmese government reported that the provision of agricultural inputs remains limited and the farm yields smaller than those before Nargis.

The slowdown in the delta’s farming sector has affected non-landowners as well. Says Kyaw Moe: "We can’t afford to hire labor like before because it’s a burden to us. With us working on our own, it means less jobs for casual laborers."

Thakan Nhu resident Khin Moe knows exactly what Kyaw Moe is saying.

Although her family received a cash grant equal to 100 dollars from the United Nations Development Programme after Nargis, Khin Moe said it has been tough going.In the past, she and her husband were able to keep their family clothed and fed by working as field hands and by fishing. After Nargis, they tried living on fishing alone.

For every two families in the village, the non-profit group World Vision had given a fishing net and boat, she says . She and her husband took out a loan to buy two more fishing nets, but they have not been able to catch much fish from the river and are now drowning in debt.

"Before Nargis, farmers in our village could provide jobs for us," Khin Moe says. "If we had (farm) jobs, we could pay the loan."

"Soon after Nargis, our life was very convenient as we received regular food aid and some jobs were created by the organizations," the 45-year-old adds. "But life is getting harder now."

UNOCHA’s Delbrevue worries that things may just get worse. "(If) people will not have any capacity, if they don’t have any asset…they will be extremely vulnerable in the future."

irrawaddy.org

[Bower]

I was in Burma 4 months after hurricane Nargis, i was amazed and a little unsure how to answer when so many people asked me why only China had offered assistance !

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180,000 need drinking water in Irrawaddy Delta
Kyaw Kha
Tuesday, 04 May 2010

Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – After more than two years since Cyclone Nargis hit Burma, the lack of drinking water continues to affect more than 180,000 residents of the Irrawaddy Delta region, according to the United Nation’s office in Rangoon.

Victims were from Labutta, Bogalay, and Mawlamyine Kyun Townships, the UN office’s spokesman, Aye Win, told Mizzima. He added that water scarcity was exacerbated by the dry season and that residents lacked an effective way to get water.

However, the figure was about half the number of those affected in the three townships last year, he said. From March to May about 350,000 people had difficulty accessing clean drinking water.

Although the region received US$6.48 million for drinking water, health-care systems and personal hygiene, US$16.16 million was still required, the UN office said.

Although the 3,800 lakes in the delta damaged by Nargis have been repaired and maintained, there were still difficulties obtaining fresh water, Aye Win said.

Lakes in Phoe Thu Chaung village (Amar Township, Phyarpone District), those that stored rainwater, had started to dry and the village would run out of drinking water in three days, a villager told Mizzima.

“There are three lakes in our village. Among them only one has water. All the people from nearby villages depend on it for water, so it’s fast to empty. Currently, the water level is just two feet (61 centimetres) so we can’t depend on it anymore. The drinking water that we stored in pots will be enough for just three days”, the villager said.

According to recent research, 180,000 people need drinking water and 100,000 people need homes, the UN reported. Although estimates for the region’s Nargis relief needs for 2009-11 reached US$691 million, it has received US$180 million.

Cyclone Nargis, which hit the Irrawaddy Delta at winds of more than 100 miles per hour (160km/h) during May 2 and May 3, 2008, killed at least 140,000 people and displaced 2.4 million people.

bnionline.net