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TAIPEI: Taiwan's leaders approved a three billion US dollar Typhoon Morakot relief budget on Thursday as public outrage grew over their response to the floods and mudslides that left up to 500 feared dead.
The cabinet approved the special budget of 100 billion Taiwan dollars to pay for typhoon relief and reconstruction over the next three years, and will submit it to parliament by the end of the week, it said in a statement.
The official death toll rose to 141, but President Ma Ying-jeou – whose popularity has sunk to an all-time low since the typhoon – has warned the number could climb to 500, with hundreds still feared buried.
Flags on government buildings will fly at half-staff to mark three days of mourning starting on Saturday, the cabinet said.
"We must set a timetable for reconstruction so the victims can resume their normal lives soon," Ma told a meeting at an orphanage in Liukuei, a southern town that was among one of the worst hit areas.
A day after a poll indicated Ma's approval rating had sunk to 16 percent and two cabinet officials tendered their resignations, a new round of newspaper editorials demanded the president sack ministers for letting down the public.
"The cabinet lacks credibility in the typhoon victims' and the general public's eyes. A cabinet that cannot command the people's trust and respect should of course be replaced," the China Times wrote in an editorial.
"The government has lost the battle of Typhoon Morakot," the Taipei Times said.
Premier Liu Chao-shiuan told a news conference Wednesday he would decide next month whether to reshuffle the cabinet and accept resignations submitted so far by the defence minister, cabinet secretary and vice foreign minister.
He declined to answer when asked about reports that he too had offered to step down.
The cabinet secretary had incurred public wrath after angrily justifying dining with his family at a five-star hotel on August 8, the day Morakot struck, saying it was Father's Day in Taiwan and "not out of line".
The defence ministry has been under fire for deploying too few troops during the initial rescue operation, with only 2,100 sent on August 9 before the number was dramatically increased to 43,300 five days later.
The vice foreign minister has taken the blame for a decision, later overturned, to refuse foreign aid.
Ma and senior cabinet officials bowed in apology to the Taiwanese people for their failures at a news conference on Tuesday.
The president promised an investigation into mistakes made and vowed to punish anyone found to have been negligent.
He also said Taiwan would create a national disaster prevention agency and reorient its military towards a greater focus on search-and-rescue operations, adding extreme weather now posed a greater threat than an invasion by China.
Typhoon Morakot dumped more than three metres (120 inches) of rain on the island, triggering floods and mudslides which tore through houses and buildings, ripped up roads and smashed bridges.
It was the worst-ever typhoon to strike Taiwan, Ma has said, saying the scale of the damage was more severe than a 1959 typhoon that killed 667 people and left around 1,000 missing.
The deadliest natural disaster in the island's history was a 7.6-magnitude quake that claimed around 2,400 lives in September 1999.
- AFP/so
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