US ships head for Myanmar as officials decry delay

Above:
Family members sit in their home destroyed by cyclone Nargis at a Myanmar town of Bogalay, southwest of Yangon May 8, 2008. Survivors with harrowing tales of villages smashed by cyclone Nargis are paddling wooden boats to the Myanmar town of Bogalay to find whole streets destroyed and food and water scarce. Almost no aid has reached one of the hardest-hit towns in the Irrawaddy delta of around 50,000 inhabitants, where the storm tore rice mills apart and washed away fishing boats. REUTERS/Strringer (MYANMAR)


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Four U.S. Navy ships steamed toward cyclone-stricken Myanmar on Thursday as the Bush administration stepped up pressure on the country's military junta to open the door to outside humanitarian assistance.

Navy helicopters and Air Force cargo planes loaded with supplies and personnel also began arriving in nearby Thailand, where U.S. officials established a staging point for possible humanitarian operations.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice phoned her Chinese counterpart to ask Beijing to persuade Myanmar to accept international aid for an estimated 1.5 million people believed to be severely affected by the Cyclone Nargis disaster. The storm is feared to have killed 100,000 people in the country.

The U.S. government believes existing stocks of relief supplies in Myanmar might be enough for about 10,000 people.

In New York, U.S. envoy to the United Nations Zalmay Khalilzad said Washington was "outraged" by the Myanmar government's delays in allowing relief workers and aid shipments.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates also spoke out forcefully, saying the Pentagon was preparing the same kind of assistance it provided after other disasters in the region, including the 2004 Asian tsunami and the 2005 Pakistan earthquake.

"There is an opportunity here to save a lot of lives and we are fully prepared to help and to help right away, and it would be a tragedy if these assets -- if people didn't take advantage of them," Gates told reporters at a Pentagon briefing.

The United States and Myanmar have long been estranged. President George W. Bush imposed a new round of sanctions on the country's military leaders just last week to pressure them on human rights and political reform.

'OUR INTEREST IS NONPOLITICAL'

Gates rejected a suggestion that suspicions among Myanmar's leaders about U.S. military intentions could help explain their reluctance to accept outside help.

"I'd be surprised if they misinterpreted our intentions that badly," he said. "Our interest here is totally nonpolitical."

Gates said the Bush administration is determined to see aid reach disaster sufferers and might accept another country as an intermediary if direct assistance proved unfeasible.

"My belief would be that if we cannot get in directly, that we would be prepared to work creatively with others in any way we could to help. And if that involves using an intermediary, perhaps we would do that," he said.

In the meantime, the Pentagon moved aircraft and ships toward Myanmar to be ready should aid be allowed to commence.

Four ships, including the destroyer USS Mustin and the three-vessel Essex Expeditionary Strike Force, began heading for the Myanmar coast from the Gulf of Thailand after deploying helicopters into Thailand for possible relief work.

Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the ships, which carry 1,800 U.S. Marines, would be off the Myanmar coast in roughly five days.

Mullen emphasized that the U.S. military would not undertake humanitarian operations without Yangon's permission.

"It's sovereign air space and you'd need their permission to fly in that air space," Mullen said.

Two Air Force C-130 Hercules cargo planes arrived at a staging point near Utaphao in southern Thailand on Thursday with 46 military personnel who were ready to establish an airstrip inside Myanmar for relief airlift if Yangon gave its permission. A third C-130 was expected.

A C-17 Globemaster cargo plane laden with water purification systems and U.S. military meals-ready-to-eat also landed at the same location.



Source: Reuters