At least 41 people died in the state of Rakhine, in western Myanmar (formerly Burma), after the passage of Cyclone Mocha, the strongest in the last decade, which left thousands of people stranded due to rising waters.
“We can confirm that there are 17 dead,” Bu Ma village administrator Karlo told a reporter from Agence France-Presse (AFP) two days after Mocha passed.
“There will be more deaths because more than 100 people are missing,” he added.
In addition to this figure, 24 deaths were reported to the same agency by an official from the neighboring village of Khaung Doke Kar, who asked not to be named for fear of reprisals from the country’s ruling military junta.
The last count of the board, carried out on Monday, showed five deaths and an undetermined number of wounded, the AFP said.
Strong winds injured more than 700 of the more than 20,000 people who had sought refuge in buildings such as monasteries and schools located on the highest points of Sittwe, the Rakhine state capital, an official told the Associated Press news agency. leader of a charitable association.
Authorities also evacuated more than 4,000 Sittwe residents to other towns in Rakhine state.
Rescue teams had to rescue some 1,000 people on Monday trapped by rising seawater, which in some parts of Myanmar’s west coast reached 3.6 meters high.
The extent of the data in one of Asia’s least developed countries is not yet known, as strong winds brought down mobile network towers, leaving much of the area without telecommunications access.
Several injuries were reported in neighboring Bangladesh, which was spared from Mocha’s direct hit.
The Cox’s Bazar region of Bangladesh, home to the world’s largest refugee camp, was in the forecast path of the storm, prompting the evacuation of hundreds of thousands of people.
A Bangladeshi government official, Enamur Rahman, said the damage was still being assessed, but around 2,000 houses were destroyed and another 10,000 damaged on the island of Saint Martin, in the Bay of Bengal and in Teknaf.
The Governing Board of Myanmar’s controlling military junta has issued disaster declarations for 17 townships in Rakhine state.
Myanmar’s military intelligence office said Mocha damaged houses, power transformers, cell towers, boats and power poles in Sittwe, Kyaukpyu and Gwa districts and on Cocos Islands, some 425 kilometers southwest of the city. largest in Myanmar, Rangoon.
The representative of the UN Development Program in Myanmar said Mocha’s arrival put “two million people at risk. Damage and losses are expected to be extensive.”
“We are ready to respond and we will need unimpeded access to all affected communities,” Titon Mitra stressed, on the social network Twitter.
Myanmar state television reported that the military junta was preparing to send food, medicine and medical personnel to the storm-affected area.
Source: TSF
