Transcript

BRENDAN TREMBATH: First to Burma, where it's a week since Cyclone Nargis struck.

Farmland in the Irrawaddy Delta is littered with thousands of corpses.

Burma's United Nations representative has thanked the international community for its generosity, and says the nation would accept aid from any quarter.

But that's not happening fast enough.

Many tonnes of supplies meant to go to the Burmese people are not moving.

I spoke earlier to ABC correspondent Peter Lloyd, who is in neighbouring Thailand. I asked him, what had the Burmese actually agreed to accept?

PETER LLOYD: It took about 24 hours of shuttle diplomacy in Rangoon between the Americans and the military high command, and what they've come up with is an offer from the Burmese to accept a single C1-30 US military cargo plane, carrying supplies, which will go in on Monday.

It's not what was initially hoped for, which was an air bridge, because the Americans have amassed a number of planes and helicopters and even a battle group off the Burmese coast, and they're looking for a much bigger operation. But at the moment, the Burmese are saying just one flight, and that will happen on Monday.

So, from the White House, their point of view is, well, they are cautiously welcoming it, but they really want more and here's Gordon Jondroe from the White House:

GORDON JOHNDROE: We hope this is the beginning of major US assistance to the Burmese people. We will continue to work with the government of Burma on additional access for US AID, non-governmental organisations, as well as our other international partners to provide assistance to help the Burmese people during their time of need.

BRENDAN TREMBATH: The White House spokesman, Gordon Johndroe.

Well, that's the Americans, but what about the rest of the aid?

PETER LLOYD: Well, there are more aid flights coming in today from the World Food Programme, they've got two shipments coming in. Overnight, they had a dispute with the Burmese military over the question of what happens to the aid once it lands, they suspended flights briefly while they accused the Burmese of basically stealing 38 tonnes of biscuits intended for about 100,000 survivors.

The reason that dispute has come about is because the World Food Programme believes that it should be involved not just in delivery but in distribution, but the point the government in Burma is making is that they have, they argue, enough scale in their military to do the distribution themselves, and they're saying that once the goods land in Burma that the military will take control of it.

Now, at the same time, the Red Cross is also sending in more flights from Malaysia and Thailand, and Burma-friendly nations, you could say, like Thailand, India and China are also sending their military aircraft with more supplies, but it's still nowhere near what's needed.

BRENDAN TREMBATH: While the waiting goes on for some nations waiting to send material in, what are the actual prospects for the Burmese people affected by this disaster?

PETER LLOYD: Well, after seven days it's becoming a pretty grim picture, in a sense, what the UN and other agencies are saying is that a second disaster is looming in terms of disease, starvation, a lack of food and water, so the scale of the crisis is actually increasing, according to Richard Horsey from the United Nations here in Bangkok.

RICHARD HORSEY: Right now, we have around 1.5 million people in urgent need of relief assistance. Some relief is getting through, but not fast enough. We've been able to reach 276,000 individuals with relief goods, that's the UN and its partners, as of a couple of days ago. More has gone in in the last couple of days. That's a significant amount, but it's not fast enough.

BRENDAN TREMBATH: Richard Horsey from the United Nations, and Peter Lloyd speaking earlier.