ADB, World Bank joins ASEAN assessment team to provide relief

by Solomon

Tuesday, 03 June 2008 21:59

New Delhi: Global financial institutes----the Asian Development Bank and the World Bank, which had stopped providing loans to the Burmese regime for almost two decades, have said they would provide assistance for an assessment of the reconstruction needs of the country after Cyclone Nargis lashed  Burma. "We have not worked in Myanmar [Burma] for over 20 years," Jason Rush, Media Relation Specialist of ADB told Mizzima on Tuesday. The assistance from the ADB and the World Bank would be part of the ASEAN-led mechanism to help Burma recover and reconstruct from the disaster that caused at least 130,000 deaths. "Obviously this is an unprecedented disaster and because of its unique nature, we are looking to see what ADB can do and this is the first step assessment," Rush said. On Monday, a team including representatives from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations' Emergency Rapid Assessment Team (ERAT), United Nations representatives and experts from the World Bank and the ADB left for Burma's cyclone-hit regions to conduct a post-Nargis Joint Assessment. The World Bank had stopped providing financial support and finished new lending to the Burmese regime since 1987 for failing to enact economic and other reforms and also for having arrears due to previous lending. The ADB also stopped providing direct assistance to Burma since 1987. But both the ADB and World Bank said it's assistance for the cyclone victims would be in the form of providing support to the ASEAN humanitarian Task Force that would be carrying out the assessment in Burma. The ASEAN-led mechanism was formed in Singapore last month during the meeting of ASEAN foreign ministers. Critics, however, said the ASEAN-led mechanism was a waste of time, did not reach the majority of the cyclone victims. However, ASEAN Secretary-General Dr. Surin Pitsuwan, who would be visiting Rangoon on June 4, to meet the ASEAN Task Force Office and meet the members of the ASEAN ERAT said, "ASEAN is committed to helping our friends in Myanmar [Burma] and will continue to do so." "The deployment of ASEAN ERAT is just the beginning of our commitments," Dr. Surin said in a press release on Tuesday. < Prev   Next >