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UN agencies aid thousands affected by powerful storm in Myanmar

UN agencies aid thousands affected by powerful storm in Myanmar

United Nations agencies are assisting people in Myanmar devastated by the country’s worst storm in more than 30 years, which stirred 160- kilometre winds and left 140 people dead and some 18,000 others homeless.

The storm hit the Bay of Bengal on 19 May and crossed the southwest coast in Myanmar near the border with Bangladesh. It also caused tidal surges and flooding in the four towns of Pauktaw, Myebon, Sittway and Kyaukpyu in Rakhine State.

Seven people are missing and the affected towns suffered extensive damage to their infrastructure, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Over 1,000 houses were destroyed and 960 damaged, as were hospital and health centres. Many schools, the majority of them primary schools, were damaged or destroyed. Shortages of food and clean water are reported – water sources were damaged by floodwaters – and communications and electricity supply have stopped.

The country’s Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement, which will coordinate the relief efforts and distribute supplies, is currently assessing the damage and needs in the affected area in cooperation with the UN country team. The Government has requested the UN country team in the capital, Yangon, to provide relief items worth $220,000, including rice, tarpaulins, medical supplies, rain water collection tanks, clothes and blankets for 18,000 people.

UN agencies are marshalling $175,000 worth of immediate assistance: the World Food Programme (WFP) provided rice for 3,700 affected families and food for work for a period of three months; the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) released $25,000 for relief items; the UN Development Programme (UNDP) provided supplies items worth $50,000 and the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) provided medicines for dysentery and cholera, corrugated sheets for roofing of schools and other goods. In addition, OCHA released a cash grant of $50,000 from its emergency resources.