Hungry Survivors

I talked to a friend from Burma on gtalk this morning. He said he was fine, but people in his neighborhood were going hungry. He lives in Shwe Pyi Thar township, a poor suburb north of Rangoon.

Mizzima confirmed that some survivors are going hungry with the following news report.

Hungry survivors scare off aid workers

Several aid workers, who went down to Burma's cyclone-devastated Irrawaddy Delta to conduct a needs assessment survey, were forced to flee after they were surrounded by villagers who might have been seeking food, an aid worker said.

The aid worker, who asked to remain anonymous, said the assessment team was in Laputta Township, nearly half of which was submerged by water, when a hundred or more villagers approached.

"The villagers looked pale and hungry," he added. "They might have wanted to ask for food, but the assessment team thought it was dangerous, so they left."

The assessment team returned to Rangoon.

The aid worker, who did not want to name the assessment teams organization, said no material aid has yet reached the Laputta region.

According to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), 92 percent of houses in Laputta Township were destroyed by the Cyclone Nargis, which swept through the region on Friday and Saturday.