Myanmar

Myanmar hosts cyclone aid meeting

by Hannah Lippitt

Article published on the 2008-05-25 Latest update 2008-05-25 17:58 TU

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon shakes hands with Myanmar's Prime Minister Thein Sein.
(Photo : Reuters)

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon is in Myanmar for an international aid conference to raise funds for the victims of Cylcone Nargis. About 50 countries, as well as UN agencies and aid groups, are taking part in the conference which was organised by the UN and Myanmar's neighbours.

Ban called the event an "important exercise for building greater trust and cooperation" between Myanmar and the outside world, although it remains unclear how much money was actually pledged. However the final figure was believed to be far short of the 6.8 billion dollars that Myanmar last week indicated it would seek.

The UN-Secretary General has rejected Myanmar's insistence that the emergency relief phase was over and that it was now time to focus on rebuilding the devastated areas of the Irrawaddy Delta.

"I expect the relief effort will run for several months, probably six months at least, as we feed and care for those who have lost everything," he said.

The visit is the first of a UN secretary general to Myanmar for more than four decades. Ban held talks with secretive junta leader Than Shwe on Friday and said the general had agreed to let in all foreign aid workers.

But more than three weeks after the cyclone, which left more than 133,000 dead or missing, access to the area has been extremely limited.

The United States and France have aid ships off Myanmar that have been refused by the junta and have said the regime had to let disaster experts into the delta to assess the situation and help with relief.