NO POLITICS, PLEASE, WE'RE DYING

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MYANMAR DISASTER UPDATE: "PLEASE HELP"

RARE APPEAL TO OUTSIDE WORLD BY BURMESE JUNTA

Super-Hurricane Kills Thousands

Tens of thousands dead. Hundreds of thousands homeless. Millions hungry, as the "rice bowl of Asia" is broken by an 120mph cyclone. The effects will linger for months, worldwide.

This is far worse than any natural disaster the United States has ever suffered. The death toll is already much higher than the Johnstown Flood, the Chicago Fire, the San Francisco Earthquake, the Galveston Hurricane, 9/11 or the recent flood in New Orleans

Your help is desperately needed right now. Please go to one of the NGO disaster relief sites linked below and give what you can. Then click on the U.S. gov't links to let your representatives in Washington know how you feel about Bush cheaping out on yet another major disaster. Do it now. Please. Thanks.

"Myanmar Cyclone Toll Rises to 15,000; 30,000 Missing"

"U.S. Hurricanes"

"Hurricane History"
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"Myanmar says more than 10,000 killed in cyclone"

by Hla Hla Htay 17 minutes ago

"YANGON (AFP) - Myanmar said Monday more than 10,000 people died in the cyclone that battered the impoverished nation, whose secretive military rulers made a rare appeal for international help to cope with the tragedy.

Reeling from the weekend disaster, which also left thousands missing, the Southeast Asian country once known as Burma -- one of the world's poorest -- warned that the staggering death toll could still rise further.

'There could be more casualties,' said Nyan Win, foreign minister of the military junta which has ruled the country with an iron fist for decades, and normally puts tight restrictions on aid agencies from the outside world.

'We will welcome help like this from other countries, because our people are in difficulty,' he said."

"The disaster looked set to put even more pressure on the precarious food supply in the region, with the damage to Myanmar's rice-producing regions not yet known. Myanmar notably has a deal to export rice to Sri Lanka.

As fears mounted that the toll would rise sharply, aid organisations were battling the devastation on the ground and the difficulties of getting supplies and personnel into one of the world's most isolated nations.

'If we look at the emergency needs for shelter and drinking water, there are several hundred thousand people who will need urgent assistance,' Richard Horsey, a UN official in neighbouring Thailand, told AFP."

HOW YOU CAN HELP RIGHT NOW:

DONATE TO DISASTER RELIEF AGENCIES ONLINE

MYANMAR MAP:
http://www.asterism.info/...

PATH OF THE STORM:
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/...

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