By IRNA,
Berlin : German Development Aid Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul called on Russia and China, as members of the UN Security Council, to intensify their pressure on the Burmese military junta to finally open its border for international aid for hundreds of thousands of victims of Cyclone Nargis.
Talking to Tuesday’s edition of the Passauer Neuen Press newspaper, the minister stressed that the international community had the responsibility to stand by people in emergency situations, if their government deliberately fails to protect them.
Wieczorek-Zeul urged the Myanmar government to hand over the relief operations to the UN.
“No government in this world, least of all one which is comprised of military, is capable of conducting an aid action of this dimension,” she added.
Last week, German Chancellor Angela Merkel had already urged the intervention of the UN Security Council to force the Myanmar military junta to allow international aid for hundreds of thousands of victims of Cyclone Nargis.
“From the point of view of the federal (German) government the UN Security Council has to deal with the issue,” Merkel’s deputy spokesperson Thomas Steg was quoted saying.
Steg expressed the chancellor’s “incomprehension” over the fact that Burmese military rulers were still blocking international relief.
The German Foreign Ministry had also called in Myanmar ambassador last Thursday to voice its protest over the ongoing delays of international aid deliveries in the aftermath of the devastating Cyclone Nargis.