'Our government in Burma is lying when it says just a few people were killed'

With panic in his face, the fisherman beckoned me to lie down and hide at the prow of his longboat. The Burmese navy was patrolling its territorial waters and looking for interlopers as it sought to preserve the dictatorship's fiction that only 90 people died in last weekend's devastating tsunami.

The splintered remains of a wooden bridge just ahead, on the large island of Palao Ton Ton, told a different story. The fisherman said he saw 50 people swept to their deaths from this bridge alone. The red-and-white woodwork lay smashed in pieces and a large gap yawned in the middle of the span.

"All the people were just swept away," said the fisherman hopelessly, his face shaded by a wide-brimmed, khaki hat. He was sheltering at an inlet across the water when the tsunami struck with deadly force. He went to help but there were no survivors.

"They were on foot, trying to cross over to the land side," he said. "Look, there are bits of the bridge still floating in the water. That is all that is left."

In the aftermath of the tsunami the government in Rangoon sealed off parts of its coastline, fuelling concerns that thousands more people died in the disaster than it - to the disgust of many ordinary Burmese - has so far been prepared to acknowledge.

Other fishermen spoke of the terrible loss of life farther up the coast at Kra Buri, 50 miles north of the border with Thailand. "Many, many homes were ripped away by the big wave," said one fisherman. "The government is lying, lying very much, when it says just a few people were killed."

While aid workers believe that Burma escaped the carnage that was visited on Indonesia, where about 100,000 people are feared to have lost their lives, they say the death toll is certain to be higher than Burmese officials have admitted. "It is in the thousands," estimated one foreign diplomat.

Burma is a closed society and the regime is hostile to outside influences. Journalists are banned and tight controls are placed on the movements of aid workers and diplomats. The climate of fear instilled by almost four decades of military dictatorship is such that any Burmese willing to help in exposing suffering and loss of life faces a long jail sentence.

Since the tsunami the military's grip has become even tighter. Conscript soldiers have been deployed on main roads leading out of the southern town of Kawthaung. They have orders to prevent foreign nationals from travelling more than two miles from the centre. The naval vessels are looking for boats that they do not recognise in order to prevent unauthorised missions landing along the ravaged coastline.

A government official intercepted our vehicle as we left Kawthaung with the aim of catching a glimpse of the damage wreaked on one of the world's last dictatorships. "Go back now," he told us. "I cannot give you permission to leave town and the army checkpoints will stop you. There is nothing to see. We are handling the situation in our own way."

Instead, and despite the navy patrols, we took to the sea and made a hazardous boat trip across a mile-long stretch of estuary on the Andaman Sea.

The fisherman who agreed to take us up the coast to Palao Ton Ton was too scared for his name to be used. He did not want to stay more than a few minutes in such a sensitive area with foreigners on board. He turned the boat back towards Kawthaung and then indicated the lush hillsides where hundreds of homes still clung precariously to the land at the water's edge. "This is how we live, all the way up the coast," he said. "Not all were so lucky to have escaped."

Kawthaung itself survived the worst of the waves because it is protected by a ring of outlying islands. Even so, boats out in the bay were lifted 30ft on to the main road by the force of the water.

There are many remote islands that no one has yet reached. The fishermen who ply these waters and know them well tell of widespread devastation on the Coco Islands and the Mergui Archipelago. The vast island chains, which belong to Burma, lie in a swathe across the Andaman Sea, north of Thailand's Phuket peninsula and south of India's Nicobar island chain - both of which suffered heavy loss of life.

Aid workers in Rangoon have repeatedly pressed the government for permission to inspect the islands but have been rebuffed. Their population has never been surveyed and the tribes who live there are renowned for their amphibian way of life. Estimating the likely death toll would be very difficult.

"The government says that it is possible to go but say the local fisherman claim that the tides are particularly high, making sailing unsafe. But we cannot see any difference," one aid worker said. "It is also impossible to fly over the area because it is a designated military zone."

Two days after the tsunami, when neighbouring governments were gratefully accepting overseas assistance in the mass rescue operation, Rangoon brushed aside most offers of help, accepting a token £104,000 worth of aid from communist China.

Brig-Gen Aung Thein, the government's spokesman, declared that only 36 people had died. By the end of the week diplomats were told that the total had risen to just 90.

Further clues to the extent of the damage come, however, in reports of foreigners who are missing in the area. Two South African backpackers and a group of Christian charity workers have not been in contact with friends and relatives for a week. A Florida-based missionary group has launched an appeal to rebuild a Burmese village destroyed in the tsunami.

Here is an extract from what the military government said about the disaster in Burma:

Next, Deputy Minister for Information Brig-Gen Aung Thein told the newsmen about strong earthquake occurred in the Indian Ocean and damages in some areas in Myanmar. An earthquake of severe intensity with its epicentre about 1600 kilometres Northwest of Jakarta, Indonesia took place at 07:32:4 on 26 December. After that, nine earthquakes of intensity about 6.0 on the Richter Scale were recorded in the Andaman Sea. The eighth earthquake of strong intensity with 6.1 on the Richter Scale with its epicentre about 100 kilometres Southwest of Kokogyun took place at 09:38:42. The ninth one of strong intensity with 7.3 on the Richter Scale centred about 640 kilometres south of Kokogyun was recorded.

Some buildings collapsed in Taninthayi, Yangon, Bago and Ayeyawady Divisions and some regions in Rakhine and Shan State (South) due to the earthquake and coastal regions were hit by tidal waves. According to the latest information received, 138 buildings were destroyed and 788 people were homeless. Thirty six people were killed, 45 injured and 14 missing. Chairman of Ayeyawady Division Peace and Development Council Commander Maj-Gen Soe Naing, Minister for Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement Maj-Gen Sein Htwa and acting Director-General Dr U Tin Win Maung of the Ministry of Health visited the earthquake-hit regions in Ayeyawady Division yesterday morning and provided relief to the victims. Chairmen of State/Division Peace and Development Councils also visited the affected areas and carried out rescue operations.

Source:http://www.myanmar.com/nlm/enlm/Dec29_h6.html

Here the dead numbers the military government announced is not accurate!They said only 36 people were killed! If you've watched CNN or BBC or others news channels that give information on my country, you'll know that the dead numbers in Burma are more than these figures officially given by the regime! That shows the regime is trying not to attract the international attention to my country.As I said before, I very much hope the affected people in Burma will not be forgotten to give a helping hand.

All the best,

sayakyi

Which tv cameras could be there to report on what really happened to those poor Burmese living along the river when the junta tries to hide the death toll even from his own people!( Sorry to say that to you. I know what you meant in your reply. I just want to emphasize it a bit stronger.) The Burmese people living in the country don't even get to know how any people were killed in the other involved countries!

Burma is the country where it is forbidden to speak of the dead numbers caused by this tsunami!

May God be with those helpless affected people

Give them the strength to live on,

The hopes they will be helped.

Amen.

err, sorry to jump all over your political bandwagons, but I am inside the Mergui Archipelago now and I can say first hand that there is certainly NOT thousands dead.
The impact of the tsunami was minimal here. The islands of the Mergui Archipelago, in particular - were extremely lucky - however for geographical and physical reasons, we have escaped any major catastrophes here.

Stop your sensationalist rubbish everyone, thanks!

Err, sorry to say that I don't buy your story. Really sorry!
So you are inside the country for the time being.May I ask for whom you are working for and how you got the permission to be there? How much money did you have to bribe for that?

Is this a rubbish what we are here talking about? Do you mean to say we are over-emotional? And the prayers are useless?

If you don't want to hear our "rubbish", the choice is up to you.

Thanks for the info.

Best regards,

P.S. Are you a Burmese?

May God bless you,
Amen.

I am a foreign national resident in the Mergui Archipelago for 6 years. Nobody bribed me to be here. I am neither affilliated to the military or any NGO. I am here by my own choice. Given that I have been here for 6 years, then I would hope you are intelligent enough to deduce that this means I am not here 'for the time being'. It does not surprise me in the least that you assume that I was 'bribed' for permission to be here. Give me a break. My passport is as good as anyones.

Have you ever been here? I doubt it.

There was very little effect from the tsunami here. Geographically, the Mergui Archipelago was protected by the gradual shallowing of depth between then open ocean and the inner islands and coastal areas between Dawei, Myeik, and Kawthoung. We were well protected, thank god. I have seen the effects on the areas south of the border - and it is devastating - but why would anyone want to try and state that an area left relatively untouched was the scene of some awful disaster??

Your rubbish? Yes - I think some of you are over emotional (and aside from that - read again to see who's post I replied to, I was merely giving facts to dispute misinformation, and telling you all to pull your heads in).
I would hazard a guess to say that I am the only person in this thread who is actually able to see first hand what has happened here - instead of the majority who either guessed (wrongly) or relied on outside media, to have some opinion on the extent of effects from the Dec 26th disaster.

You don't by my story? Bad luck. I am here in the southern islands of Myanmar/Burma and I stand by my original post.

SVB

Burma can look after itself, generals and aid agencies
agree
January 7, 2005

The United Nations has concluded that damage to Burma
from the tsunami has been relatively light, with just
over 50 people confirmed dead and a few thousand in
need of assistance.

That conclusion, based on field reports from
independent aid agencies, contrasts sharply with
Thailand, where more than 5000 have been confirmed
dead.

It also contradicts a statement earlier this week by
the UN World Food Program that probably hundreds of
people died in Burma and that 30,000 people were in
need - estimates the agency revised down on Wednesday
to 60 dead and 10,000 in need.

Charles Petrie, the United Nations' resident
co-ordinator in Rangoon, Burma's capital, said he was
confident the tsunami's impact had been minimal. "We
need to move on to other issues here because there are
many more important humanitarian issues to deal with
right now."

Mr Petrie said distrust of the Burmese Government and
the discrepancy between its figures and those from
nearby countries probably contributed to the much
higher early casualty estimates.

Perhaps Burma's largest loss of life in a single
incident occurred in Kaw Thoung, near the Thai border,
when about 20 people gathered on a bridge across tidal
flats to watch the wave. The bridge was swept away.

Burma's military rulers were capable of caring for
the country's victims and aid should be sent
elsewhere, the Prime Minister, Lieutenant-General Soe
Win, said yesterday.

Speaking at the international donors' conference in
Jakarta, he said more than 3000 people had been left
homeless but his government's quick action meant the
country was "able to mitigate the effects of the
disaster".

The New York Times

Copyright © 2005. The Sydney Morning Herald.

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