Myanmar’s junta confines foreigners, tightens security

Myanmar's military rulers have thrown a ring of security around Yangon, blocking aid workers, foreign diplomats and journalists.

Myanmar’s military rulers have thrown a tightening ring of security around Yangon, blocking aid workers, foreign diplomats and journalists from reaching cyclone-battered regions where millions need food and medicine.

New roadblocks staffed by armed police have sprung up around Myanmar’s largest city. Authorities at the checkpoints record passport information and license plate numbers and sometimes interrogate drivers and their foreign passengers before ordering them to return to Yangon.

“A circle has been drawn around Yangon and expats are confined there. While you are getting aid through, it’s like getting it through a 7.6-centimeter pipe, not a 76-centimeter pipe,” said Tim Costello, president of the aid agency World Vision-Australia, in Yangon.

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“Foreigners can’t go this way,” a policeman told a driver for a foreign journalist on Friday at a checkpoint with 10 police and an immigration official dressed in khaki.

The reporter was heading north of Yangon, not even in the direction of the Irrawaddy delta, where Cyclone Nagris spent its greatest fury two weeks ago.

The United Nations says more than 100,000 people may have perished, while up to 2.5 million survivors face starvation and disease.

In the week after the storm hit, entry by foreigners into the delta was difficult but not impossible. However, the security cordon has been noticeably tightened in recent days, with numerous new roadblocks thrown up along roads leading south and west into the delta from Yangon.

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The Foreign Ministry will take some diplomats on a visit to the delta on Saturday, said US Ambassador Shari Villarosa. Diplomats, who must seek official permission to travel outside Yangon, have faced the same barriers in trying to enter the affected region.

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