Cyclone-hit Myanmar seeks $11 billion in aid: ASEAN
YANGON (Reuters) - Myanmar's military government wants more than $11 billion in aid for cyclone victims, but international donors need access to verify their needs, a top Southeast Asian diplomat said on Wednesday.
ASEAN chief Surin Pitsuwan also said a Myanmar cabinet minister told him that French oil giant Total SA was willing to transfer aid and equipment from French and U.S. Navy ships waiting in waters near the former Burma.
Minister of Planning and Economic Development Soe Tha "told us Total is going to do the transfer" of aid from the ships, Surin said in an interview with Reuters.
Details of how the supplies would be transferred -- by helicopter or other means -- were not discussed, the Secretary-General of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) said.
Total denied this was the case.
"Total has currently no plan for such an assistance scheme (with the French and U.S. Navy) but is getting ready to assist local non-governmental organizations with regards to the logistics needed for the shipment of materials and food supply," a Total spokeswoman said.
Total has donated $2 million to the Red Cross and the Red Crescent as part of relief efforts.
The French firm, one of the biggest foreign investors in Myanmar, operates the offshore Yadana gas field and a pipeline that runs to the shore and overland to neighboring Thailand.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who was due in Yangon on Thursday, said relief workers had so far been able to reach only a quarter of those in need among an estimated 2.4 million people made destitute by the May 2 storm and sea surge that left nearly 134,000 dead or missing.
ASEAN is convening a donor conference jointly with the United Nations on Sunday, amid criticism in the West that too few foreign aid experts have been allowed into the stricken Irrawaddy Delta to establish aid distribution networks.
Surin said the military government is seeking $11 billion in pledged aid from the conference.
"The concern is for the international community to pledge assistance 'How do we know it's $11 billion? How can we be certain?'," said the former Thai foreign minister.
"Accessibility is important to guarantee confidence and verify the damage and needs, otherwise confidence during pledging will be affected," he said.
Surin said a rapid-assessment team of ASEAN members needed to be on the ground and continue to report to come up with a "credible needs analysis" trusted by the donors before pledging.
The diplomat said the military government, criticized for a slow and inefficient response to the disaster, "realized the magnitude of the damage".
Until this week, the junta's attention appeared to have been on a May 10 referendum on a constitution drafted by the army.
Diplomats said their attitude appeared to change just before an emergency meeting of ASEAN in Singapore on Monday that established an aid framework to accommodate the generals' concerns.
(additional reporting by Marie Maitre in Paris)
(Writing by Grant McCool; Editing by Darren Schuettler and David Fogarty)
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