West urges Myanmar to act on crucial cyclone aid

By Aung Hla Tun

YANGON (Reuters) - Heavy rains pelted homeless cyclone survivors in Myanmar's Irrawaddy delta on Tuesday, complicating the already slow delivery of aid to more than 1.5 million people facing hunger and disease.

As more foreign aid trickled into the former Burma, critics ratcheted up the pressure on its military rulers to accelerate a relief effort that is only delivering an estimated tenth of the supplies needed in the devastated delta.

In Brussels, the European Union called on the military junta to allow entry to aid workers to help victims avert "an even greater tragedy," and France urged U.N. action if the junta did not cooperate. Spain said that failure to allow aid in could amount to a crime against humanity.

The United Nations says more than 1.5 million people are struggling to survive and up to 100,000 are dead or missing after cyclone Nargis hit.

U.N. spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said in Geneva it was also vital to secure the means to deliver aid.

"We need a kind of air bridge or sea bridge, and huge means (just) as the aid delivery we did in the tsunami, it is the same kind of logistical operation," said Byrs, of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

The junta has accepted aid from the outside world but the help has only trickled in as the rulers have made it clear they do not want outsiders distributing it.

In a statement after emergency talks on Myanmar in Brussels, EU development ministers called on Yangon "to offer free and unfettered access to international humanitarian experts, including the expeditious delivery of visa and travel permits."