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YANGON - Myanmar's military government is evicting cyclone victims from refugee camps as it belittles foreign aid efforts as mere handouts of chocolate bars.
Locals and aid workers said on Friday that 39 camps in the immediate vicinity of Kyauktan, 30 km south of Yangon, were being cleared as part of a general eviction plan.
"It is better that they move to their homes where they are more stable," a government official said at one camp where people had been told to clear out at short notice. "Here, they are relying on donations and it is not stable."
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 told a meeting of aid groups.
"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.
Centralizing 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 nonexistent.
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.
After several days of praising the work of the United Nations and charities, Myanmar on Friday reverted to a hardline stance against foreign assistance.
State-run newspapers lashed out at foreign aid donors, saying cyclone victims did not need supplies of "chocolate bars" and could instead survive by eating frogs and fish.
The New Light of Myanmar newspaper, a government mouthpiece, also warned that foreign relief workers could snoop inside homes, and condemned donors for linking aid money to full access to the hardest-hit regions in the Irrawaddy Delta.
"The government and the people are like parents and children," the paper said. "We, all the people, were pleased with the efforts of the government."
Myanmar needs 11 billion dollars to recover from the storm, but donors have pledged just 150 million dollars so far, it said.
"Myanmar people are capable enough of rising from such natural disasters even if they are not provided with international assistance," the newspaper said.
"Myanmar people can easily get fish for dishes by just fishing in the fields and ditches," the paper said. "In the early monsoon, large edible frogs are abundant."
"The people (of the Irrawaddy Delta) can survive with self-reliant efforts even if they are not given chocolate bars from (the) international community," it added.
No aid agencies are known to have provided chocolate bars to victims of Cyclone Nargis.
The United Nations estimates that about one million people in the delta are still without emergency aid.
The military government drew international outrage for three weeks of delays in allowing foreign aid workers access to the delta region, although the United Nations said Thursday that all of its staff had now been granted visas.
The official newspaper also took a swipe at a world monetary organisation for refusing to give aid -- apparently a reference to the World Bank, which has said no loans could be given because Myanmar has not been repaying its debts.
It also criticised countries for maintaining sanctions on Myanmar despite the cyclone devastation.
"Do such countries really have humanitarian spirit?" the paper said.
It was apparently referring to the United States, which renewed sanctions on Myanmar two weeks after the storm, accusing the military government of suppressing the pro-democracy movement.
The United States has insisted the sanctions will not affect humanitarian aid, which US military planes have helped deliver into the country.
Late Friday, Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong of Singapore, which currently chairs the 10-member ASEAN, of which Myanmar is a member, criticised the military government's reaction to the aid offered.
"Myanmar's partners in ASEAN have all been deeply concerned by the massive suffering of the victims, which a more rapid international relief operation could have minimised," Prime Minister Lee said in a keynote address to a regional security forum in Singapore. - AFP/CNA/ir
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