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BANGKOK : The United Nations is to stop flying in aid to Myanmar next month, forcing relief agencies to find another way to bring in vital supplies to cyclone survivors, its logistics head told AFP Wednesday.
The UN's World Food Programme will stop ferrying aid between Thailand's Don Muang airport and Myanmar's main city Yangon from August 10, and withdraw five helicopters from use.
Closure of the logistical operation also means WFP will no longer provide warehousing space or dozens of trucks and boats previously available to aid agencies working since Cyclone Nargis hit early May.
Aid groups will be forced to rely on their own boats and trucks to get essential supplies to the worst-hit delta region. Remaining cargo at Bangkok's Don Muang will be transported by sea.
"As of August 10th the full operation will be complete. From the beginning we were always intending to have three months of fast emergency response so we are phasing out our logistics services," WFP's Kevin Howley told AFP.
WFP's logistics hub has brought 169 aid flights into Yangon since the cyclone hit, leaving 138,000 people dead or missing, and ferried a total of nearly 8,000 metric tonnes of aid to needy survivors.
The UN's humanitarian chief, John Holmes, said Monday the aid response was still in its relief phase, but aid agencies told AFP they were ready to cope without WFP's help.
"We're definitely still in the relief phase, there's still a big need just to deliver food, never mind everything else. But I'm not sure that the closure of the airbridge is necessarily contradictory to that," Guy Cave of Save the Children told AFP.
"We are bringing in things by sea now and with a bit of planning, we can get it in in time."
"Helicopters are extremely expensive so you need to use them when time is of the essence," Julia Newton-Howes, CEO of aid agency Care Australia, told AFP.
"Now distribution points have been set up right across the delta down to the small areas. Systems to cope have been put in place, so it seems like a sensible strategy."
Myanmar's ruling generals drew worldwide condemnation after the cyclone for blocking entry to many foreign aid workers and relief shipments, relenting only after a personal visit by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Monday released a report saying rebuilding Myanmar's cyclone-ravaged south and bringing aid to millions of survivors would cost one billion dollars over the next three years.
- AFP /ls
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