Myanmar junta makes rare request for foreign aid to cope with deadly floods

Local residents wade through a flooded road near Shwe Maw Taw pagoda in Bago, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) northeast of Yangon, Myanmar, Oct. 9, 2023. [Courtesy]

Myanmar's junta chief made a rare request Saturday for foreign aid to cope with deadly floods that have displaced hundreds of thousands of people who have already endured three years of war.

Floods and landslides have killed almost 300 people in Myanmar, Vietnam, Laos and Thailand in the wake of Typhoon Yagi, which dumped a colossal deluge of rain when it hit the region last weekend.

In Myanmar, more than 235,000 people have been forced from their homes by floods, the junta said Friday, piling further misery on the country where war has raged since the military seized power in 2021.

In Taungoo -- around an hour south of the capital Naypyidaw -- residents paddled makeshift rafts on floodwaters that reached the roofs of some buildings.

Around 300 people were sheltering at a monastery on high ground in a nearby village.

"We are surrounded by water and we don't have enough food for everyone," one man said.

"We need food, water, and medicine as priority."

Outside another temple, Buddhist nuns in pink and orange robes waded through knee-deep water.

"I lost my rice, chickens, and ducks," said farmer Naing Tun, who had brought his three cows to higher ground near Taungoo after floodwaters inundated his village.

"I don't care about the other belongings. Nothing else is more important than the lives of people and animals," he told AFP.

- Flee by any means -

The rains in the wake of typhoon Yagi sent people across Southeast Asia fleeing by any means necessary, including by elephant in Myanmar and jetski in Thailand.

"Officials from the government need to contact foreign countries to receive rescue and relief aid to be provided to the victims," junta chief Min Aung Hlaing said on Friday, according to the Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper.

"It is necessary to manage rescue, relief and rehabilitation measures as quickly as possible," he was quoted as saying.

Myanmar's military has previously blocked or frustrated humanitarian assistance from abroad.

Last year it suspended travel authorisations for aid groups trying to reach around a million victims of powerful Cyclone Mocha that hit the west of the country.