Myanmar PM promises better homes for cyclone victims
Myanmar's premier promised better housing for cyclone victims in the devastated Irrawaddy Delta, where many people have received only a plastic sheet to use for shelter, state media said yesterday.
Cyclone Nargis left more than 138,000 people dead or missing when it struck Myanmar on May 2, washing away entire villages. Another 2.4 million people are in need of food, shelter, or other aid.
"Plans are under way... to accommodate (the homeless) at better houses than the previous ones they lived (in)," Prime Minister Thein Sein said in the official New Light of Myanmar newspaper.
He also said the military government was working to restore the livelihoods of those in the delta, one of Myanmar's most important farming regions.
"Officials concerned are to supervise cultivation tasks," Thein Sein said during a tour of the delta on Sunday, adding that seeds and tools would be distributed to help survivors replant their destroyed vegetable crops.
Myanmar's junta has come under fierce international condemnation for its slow response to the cyclone and for imposing restrictions on aid workers that have delayed the delivery of relief supplies.
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