The World Health Organization (WHO) warns hundreds of thousands of victims of Burma’s devastating Cyclone Nargis face a potentially serious health crisis.  WHO and partner agencies are launching a multi-million-dollar, six-month action plan to provide immediate health care and to support longer-term efforts to rebuild the country’s ravaged healthcare system.  Official figures stand at nearly 78,000 dead and 56,000 missing from the storm.  Unofficial estimates of the number of dead and missing are considerably higher.  Lisa Schlein reports for VOA from WHO headquarters in Geneva. (more…)

Myanmar Friday appointed its Deputy Foreign Minister U Kyaw Thu as Chairman representing the country in a Yangon-based tripartite core group, the State Radio quoting the National Disaster Preparedness Central Committee reported. (more…)

The government will seek more assistance to help orphans who lost their parents to Cyclone Nargis, Public Health Minister Chaiya Sasomsab said Friday. (more…)

A senior UN official has said that any coercion of Burmese cyclone victims to return home is completely unacceptable. (more…)

The International Labour Organisation warned on Friday of an increased risk Myanmar’s ruling military may try to use forced labour — including children — to rebuild the country after this month’s cyclone. (more…)

The White House on Friday expressed frustration at the pace of aid flows into Myanmar after devastating Cyclone Nargis and said the ruling junta’s new constitution lacks legitimacy. (more…)

Burma’s junta is willing to let its people starve while relief waits just offshore. (more…)

When Cyclone Nargis ravaged Burma, it did not spare political prisoners. The notorious Insein Prison, where hundreds of political prisoners are locked up, was one of the hardest-hit sites in Rangoon. (more…)

When the Burmese junta refused international aid, the U.S. Air Force proposed food drops to deliver aid in the cyclone-ravaged regions of Myanmar. The U.S. military should have pushed through with its plan even without U.N. backing. After all, it had no qualms dropping lethal bombs in Indochina forty years ago. It would have been symbolic if U.S. jets were dropping aid boxes instead of napalm bombs. (more…)

Secretary-General of ASEAN, Dr Surin Pitsuwan, chaired the second meeting of the ASEAN Humanitarian Task Force on 29 May 2008 at the ASEAN Secretariat.  Dr Surin reported signs of progress and momentum in assisting the victims of Cyclone Nargis in Myanmar. More relief supplies have been sent and more helicopters of the World Food Programme have flown into the affected areas in the Irrawaddy delta.  Dr Surin described these developments as “signs of good progress”. (more…)

“People from the Irrawaddy delta can survive on their own, even without bars of chocolate donated by the international community… [they can live on] fresh vegetables that grow wild in the fields and on protein-rich fish from the rivers.” – The Myanma Ahlin (SPDC-run newspaper)

Myanmar’s junta announced Thursday that its new constitution had been “confirmed and enacted” after a referendum held earlier this month amid the devastation of Cyclone Nargis. (more…)

It’s not much, but the flimsy bamboo lean-to on the side of the road is all Aye Shwe has to keep his family dry. They lost their home to the cyclone and may soon be uprooted again – this time by soldiers ordering them to leave. (more…)

Technical changes have been made to prevent Internet users from using proxy servers to get around government controls, according to an announcement from Myanmar Teleport, one of the country’s two Internet service providers (ISPs). (more…)

Several Rangoon newspapers sanctioned by the Burmese junta blasted the idea of “opening up” to foreign aid workers and criticized refugees who lined the roads leading to the cyclone-stricken area, saying they made the country look bad. (more…)

Burma’s censorship board, infamous for its stranglehold on the media, has denied permission to Rangoon based weekly journals from publishing stories on the cyclone devastation. In depth stories focussing on cyclone devastated Irrawaddy delta were cut by the censors, said an editor of a weekly journal. (more…)

International aid agencies have sent scores of foreign experts in to the most ravaged areas of cyclone-hit Myanmar in the past few days. But many organizations are urging the nation’s military rulers to allow even wider access. (more…)

Burmese migrant workers in southern Thailand’s Phan-nga district have collected over 200,000 baht in donations from the migrant community to help victims of Cyclone Nargis in Burma. (more…)

China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), the parent of PetroChina, said it has signed a memorandum of understanding with South Korea’s Daewoo International for joint oil and gas exploration in Myanmar. (more…)

Border trade between Burma and Bangladesh resumed this week after being stalled in the aftermath of cyclone Nargis in Burma, said a businessman. (more…)