YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — A powerful tropical cyclone killed more than 350 people in Myanmar and destroyed thousands of homes, the state-run news media said Sunday. Some dissident groups worried that the military junta running the country would be reluctant to ask for international help.
For the junta, the cyclone, called Nargis, hit at a delicate time: a week ahead of a referendum on a new constitution.
Should the military dictatorship be seen as failing disaster victims, voters, many of whom already say the government has ruined the economy and suppressed democracy, could be more inclined to oppose the constitution.
Some in Yangon, formerly Rangoon, complained that the 400,000-member military was doing little to help victims after the storm, which hit Friday and Saturday.
“Where are all those uniformed people who are always ready to beat civilians?” asked a trishaw taxi driver, who said he did not want to be identified because he feared retribution.
“They should come out in full force and help clean up the areas and restore electricity,” he said.
Myanmar, a country of about 48 million people that was formerly called Burma, has been under military rule since 1962. Its government has been widely criticized for human rights abuses and for stifling of pro-democracy parties like the National League for Democracy. That group is led by Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize laureate, who has been under house arrest for most of the past 18 years.
In September, at least 31 people were killed and thousands were detained when the military cracked down on peaceful protests led by Buddhist monks and democracy advocates.
In response to the cyclone, the Forum for Democracy in Burma and other dissident groups outside Myanmar urged the military junta to allow aid groups to operate freely — as it has historically been reluctant to do.
It would be difficult for other countries to help unless they received a request from the military rulers.
“International expertise in dealing with natural disasters is urgently required,” said Naing Aung, secretary general of the forum, which is based in Thailand. “The military regime is ill prepared to deal with the aftermath of the cyclone.”
The storm’s winds, which reached 120 miles per hour, blew the roofs off hospitals and cut electricity to Yangon, Myanmar’s largest city.
Shari Villarosa, the top American diplomat in Yangon, said the storm had caused “major devastation throughout the city.”
“The Burmese are saying they have never seen anything like this — ever,” Ms. Villarosa said. “Trees are down. Electricity lines are down. Our Burmese staff have lost their roofs.”
At least 351 people were killed, including 162 who lived on Haing Gyi island, off the country’s southwest coast, the military-run news media reported. Many of the others died in the low-lying Irrawaddy Delta.
“The Irrawaddy Delta was hit extremely hard, not only because of the wind and rain, but because of the storm surge,” said Chris Kaye, the acting relief coordinator for the United Nations in Yangon. “The villages there have reportedly been completely flattened.”
State television reported that in the Labutta township in the delta, 75 percent of the buildings had collapsed.
The United Nations planned to send teams on Monday to assess the damage, Mr. Kaye said. Such efforts have been hampered by roads clogged with debris and downed phone lines, he said.
“At the moment, we have such poor opportunity for communications that I can’t really tell you very much,” Mr. Kaye said.
Yangon residents said that the price of gasoline had jumped Sunday from $2.50 a gallon to $10 a gallon on the black market, and prices of everything from eggs to construction supplies had tripled.
The state-owned newspaper New Light of Myanmar reported that the international airport in Yangon remained closed, though the state-run television said it could be opened by Monday. Domestic flights have been diverted to the airport in Mandalay.
The referendum, on the military-supported draft constitution, is scheduled for Saturday. The authorities have not yet said whether they will postpone the vote.
A military-managed national convention was held intermittently for 14 years to lay down guidelines for a new constitution, which is to lead to a general election in 2010 under a “road map to democracy” drawn up by the junta.
Critics of the junta say the draft constitution is designed to cement military power, and have urged citizens to vote no.
