Myanmar leaders accuse France of sending "warship"

UNITED NATIONS — France has sent an uninvited ship loaded with aid to the international waters off Myanmar, causing the U.N. ambassador from the Southeast Asian nation on Friday to accuse the French of dispatching a "warship."

The desire of outside countries to assist survivors of the cyclone that hit two weeks ago has clashed with Myanmar's military leadership's insistence on controlling the distribution of aid. The government wants to be seen as the benefactor of its people and regards outsiders with suspicion.

France argues that the council enshrined an agreement by world leaders at a U.N. summit in 2005 that the United Nations has a "responsibility to protect" people when nations fail to do it. But that agreement referred only to genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing.

China, Russia, South Africa and other council members contend that aid to cyclone victims is a humanitarian issue — not an issue of international peace and security to be dealt with by the U.N.'s most powerful body.

Foreign diplomats will be allowed today to tour the disaster area for the first time, Myanmar announced Friday. But no further details were available, and it was unclear how much access the diplomats will have outside the controlled tour.

The handful of foreign experts who have been allowed into the country have been restricted to Yangon, the former capital. The government has set up police and military checkpoints on roads leading out of Yangon to Irrawaddy, where foreigners are being turned back.

The country's military junta insists it can handle relief operations on its own. Its propaganda mouthpiece, The New Light of Myanmar, has printed pages of reports and photographs each day showing military officers handing out supplies and comforting victims.

Last week, French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner called the refusal of Myanmar's ruling generals to allow outsiders to aid the estimated 2.5 million survivors of Cyclone Nargis a crime against humanity.

The confrontation over the French ship came at the U.N. General Assembly after Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon reported that the world body had made no progress in winning more access to the ravaged delta after two weeks of repeated phone calls, letters and negotiations.

French Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert said he was "a little bit surprised" that the United Nations was not pushing harder.

"I was interrupted after my first sentence by the ambassador of Myanmar, who denounced the fact that France was sending a warship to Burma," Ripert told reporters. "It's not true."

Ripert said the ship is operated by the French navy, but it is not a warship. It is carrying 1,500 tons of food, drugs and medications, and it has small boats that could deliver the aid to inaccessible areas, he said. It also has small helicopters and doctors standing by to help.