Myanmar military chief says foreign help needed after deadly floods | Weather News

More than 235,000 people were forced to flee their homes following floods and landslides caused by Typhoon Yagi.

Myanmar's military chief has made a rare request for foreign aid to combat deadly floods that have forced hundreds of thousands of people who have already endured three years of civil war to flee their homes, according to state media reports.

At least 33 people were killed in floods and landslides caused by torrential rains from Typhoon Yagi, one of the most devastating storms in Asia this year, the government said, forcing more than 235,000 people to flee their homes.

“Government officials must contact foreign countries to arrange rescue and relief efforts for the victims,” ​​said army chief General Min Aung Hlaing, the state-run newspaper Global New Light of Myanmar reported on Saturday.

“It is necessary to launch rescue, relief and rehabilitation operations as soon as possible,” he was quoted as saying while overseeing the rescue and relief operations.

Myanmar's military has previously blocked or thwarted humanitarian aid from abroad.

The independent news publication Myanmar Now put the death toll from Yagi at 66. At least 300 people died in the storm in Vietnam, Thailand, Laos and the Philippines.

Images posted on social media show that some buildings in Myanmar were inundated by floods and residents, including women and children, were stranded on roofs before being taken to boats by rescue workers.

A military spokesman said contact had been lost with some parts of the country while they were investigating reports that dozens of people had been buried in landslides in a gold mining area in the central Mandalay region.

At least 3,600 people were rescued, the government said.

In Taungoo, about an hour south of the capital Naypyidaw, residents paddled on improvised rafts on the floodwaters lapping around a Buddhist pagoda.

The rescue workers drove through the water in a speedboat and used a long pole to lift up sagging power lines and broken branches.

Myanmar has been in turmoil since a military coup in February 2021, with large parts of the impoverished country gripped by violence.

An armed insurgency made up of new resistance groups and established ethnic minority armies is challenging the well-armed military amid a crippling economic crisis that could be exacerbated by the floods.

Since February 2021, more than three million people have fled the country.

About a third of Myanmar's 55 million inhabitants are dependent on humanitarian aid. But many aid organizations, such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, are unable to work in many areas due to security risks.

Last year, the military government suspended travel permits for aid organizations trying to reach around one million victims of Cyclone Mocha in the west of the country. The United Nations described the decision at the time as “unbelievable.”