MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:
Myanmar's military authorities say the death toll from Friday's 7.7 magnitude quake in the center of the country has risen to more than 2,000 people. Thousands more have been injured, and it's virtually impossible to know how many remain trapped under debris. Time is running out before the focus of the relief effort shifts from rescue to recovery. Michael Sullivan reports from neighboring Thailand.
MICHAEL SULLIVAN, BYLINE: A little more than 72 hours after the quake struck, Myanmar's state-run television interrupted programming to deliver a somber announcement.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: (Non-English language spoken).
SULLIVAN: The anchor announced a seven-day-long national state of mourning, a tacit acknowledgment, perhaps, that the window for finding survivors under the rubble is closing.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
UNIDENTIFIED CROWD: (Screaming).
SULLIVAN: At 1:20 Friday afternoon, the earthquake struck Myanmar's second-largest city, Mandalay, with such force that the minaret of this mosque crumbled into dust, taking the mosque with it, as onlookers fled in terror. Multi-story buildings fell all over the city, as well. Others remain standing, but tilting drunkenly as aftershocks threatened to bring them down, too. Here's a retired teacher in Mandalay, who doesn't want to be identified, out of fear of retaliation from the military.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Speaking Burmese).
SULLIVAN: "My house was badly damaged," she says, "So now we're sleeping out here in the road. A hotpot shop near my house just disappeared into the earth," she says. "We cannot count how many have died."
Maybe not. But with temperatures hovering around 100 degrees, sometimes more, one rescue worker, who requested anonymity for the same reasons, says you can smell them.
UNIDENTIFIED RESCUE WORKER #1: (Speaking Burmese).
SULLIVAN: "The crematoriums cannot burn all the bodies recovered," he says. "Many have still not been retrieved, and the smell coming from the rubble is so strong," he says, "rescue workers are having a very hard time, and even becoming sick."
That's in Mandalay, the city closest to the epicenter. But roughly 150 miles to the south, in the new capital Naypyidaw - opened in 2006 on the advice of an astrologer who declared it an auspicious place - a rescue worker who also insisted on anonymity out of fear of reprisal from the junta, disagrees.
UNIDENTIFIED RESCUE WORKER #2: (Speaking Burmese).
SULLIVAN: "Now," he says, "there's no power, no running water and no internet in Naypyidaw, and hundreds of buildings have just disappeared into the earth." Eighty percent of the city, he reckons, is destroyed, including a multi-story government hospital whose collapse has been confirmed by state-run media. And all this in areas rescue workers have access to. There are many more they haven't been able to reach, including many in contested areas where phone and internet access are cut off, either by the military or by the quake.
Meanwhile, calls for a ceasefire in the civil war - now in its fourth year - to allow humanitarian assistance to those who need it have been ignored by the military. On Friday, just hours after the quake, it conducted airstrikes against opposition targets in Karen State. And just yesterday, more airstrikes were reported in neighboring Shan State. The military determined to cling to power, it seems, no matter what the cost.
For NPR News, I'm Michael Sullivan in Chiang Rai.
(SOUNDBITE OF BROWN BIRD'S "SHADRACH") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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