YANGON, Myanmar – U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon arrived in Myanmar today on a diplomatic mission to persuade the ruling generals to let in a torrent of foreign assistance for millions of cyclone victims.
Ban was scheduled to meet with government ministers and international aid agencies in Yangon and then be flown by helicopter to the Irrawaddy delta, the region hardest hit by the cyclone May 2-3.
Yesterday, the government forced hundreds of refugees out of a damaged school on the outskirts of Yangon to make room for a weekend vote on a new pro-military constitution. The referendum had been delayed in parts of Myanmar because of the deadly cyclone.
“The school will be used as a polling station,” Sandar, a teacher who refused to give her last name, said yesterday. “We needed people to leave.”
The government will open polls in the delta and areas of Yangon on Saturday. The rest of the country voted May 10; state radio said the late balloting could not reverse the constitution's approval by 92.4 percent of 22 million eligible voters.
