Myanmar 'relatively unscathed' by tsunami

Myanmar 'relatively unscathed' by tsunami

MYANMAR: Myanmar was "relatively unscathed" by the tsunami that
wreaked havoc in other Indian Ocean countries last week,
according to the World Food Program, which sent an assessment
team to the army-ruled country known for its secrecy.

The UN agency said on Wednesday that the Myanmar government's
official number of 59 deaths was in the right range, backed up by
its team assessing food aid needs, the Red Cross and aid
organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders).

"We've spent a lot of effort on assessment in Myanmar. We
wanted to see for ourselves," said WFP Asia director Anthony
Banbury, putting the number of deaths at between 30 and 60.

The hardest hit area was the Irrawaddy delta region where some
10,000 people needed food aid, Banbury told a news conference in
Bangkok.

But the WFP team reported that many fishing villages escaped
serious damage on the coastline just north of Thailand's hard-hit
resorts of Khao Lak and Phuket. -- Reuters