Hundreds of thousands of people began repairing or rebuilding their homes and livelihoods on Monday after a deadly cyclone hit Myanmar and Bangladesh over the weekend.
The storm, dubbed Mocha, killed several people in Myanmar, though leaders’ accounts of the exact number are contradictory. The Myanmar government said the number was five, but the shadow government, called the Government of National Unity, may have many more sources in remote conflict areas of the country, putting the number at 18. said.
Although damage from the powerful storm was less severe than expected, hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees remained homeless, stranded, with some reports of people having to wade through the storm’s rubble to find their way home.
Damage in Myanmar was largely confined to Rakhine, Chin and other western regions, officials and aid workers said.
Ko Mio Khaing, a rescue worker in Sittwe city, the capital of Rakhine state, said two people were reported dead in her area.
“At least 90 percent of Sittwe was destroyed by the storm,” she said. “There is still a power outage and phone lines have been cut off.
Khaing Thu Kha, spokesman for the Arakan Army, a Rakhine militia, said rains had damaged food collected for emergencies and floods in Sittwe had receded, but water levels remained high in other areas. said.
The spokesperson said, “It is impossible for the revolutionary army alone to provide support, so we would like to seek support from neighboring countries, including the United Nations.”
In Chin State, where phone and internet lines have been cut since a coup d’état by Myanmar’s generals in February 2021, communications were temporarily restored just before the cyclone hit. But that wasn’t enough.
“We didn’t have enough time to tell people to evacuate,” said Sarai Manhle Liang, a program manager at the Chin Human Rights Organization.
Although there were no immediate reports of deaths in Chin State, Liang said more than 1,000 people were stranded in forests, in dire need of shelter, food and medicine, and unable to return to their homes. said. Transportation was miserable. Travelers had to brave military patrols, unexploded ordnance, and even the effects of the storm itself. The situation also made it difficult to deliver relief supplies.
Before the cyclone made landfall, strong winds and rain ripped through the tarps and bamboo huts of Rohingya refugees living in desolate camps along Bangladesh’s coastline. More than one million Rohingya have fled persecution in Rakhine State and fled to Bangladesh, where they now live in the world’s largest camps.
The storm made landfall in coastal areas around Cox’s Bazar on the Bangladesh-Myanmar border on Sunday afternoon, according to the Bangladesh Meteorological Department. At that time, The Joint Typhoon Warning Center estimated that winds of up to 255 miles per hour were blowing just before landfall.
Videos posted on social media showed a man and a woman walking in water surrounded by broken utility poles, blown tiled roofs, pieces of billboards and crumpled metal plates.
Although no deaths were immediately reported in Bangladesh, officials said about 3,000 Rohingya shelters were damaged by the cyclone, some completely destroyed. The Bangladesh Refugee Director’s Office reported that 32 learning centers and 29 mosques had been damaged.
Refugee camps spread across rugged, muddy terrain were hit by 120 landslides during the storm, displacing at least 5,300 refugees to safer locations. A total of 13,000 homes were damaged or destroyed in the wider Cox’s Bazar area. About 250,000 people are in need of food and shelter by Sunday evening, according to the Bangladesh government.
Alefa, 25, who lives with her husband and two children, ages 6 and 4, in the Cox’s Bazar area under one name, saw a storm knock down a tree in a bamboo and plastic hut. He described the situation with fear. . Her family escaped safely and took refuge in a community leader’s house.
“I would put the kids down and lay on the floor of someone’s house and think, ‘Are we going to be doing this for the rest of our lives?'” she said, her voice quivering.
Rohingya camps have been ravaged by fires and floods over the past six years, but Alefa’s hut was damaged only once, two years ago, when another storm blew the tarp roof off. was. Life for her family in Myanmar was already difficult before the army came to her village and set it on fire in October 2016. Her family lost their home and had no choice but to flee to Bangladesh, a journey that took several days on foot, she said.
Now they have to start again. She said that when she returned to her battered shack this morning, she found her cooking gas cylinder had been stolen by someone. “We would like to return to Myanmar, but it is not likely to happen anytime soon,” she said. “My two children, I have no future for them.”
Judson Jones Contributed to the report.
