US Donates 16,000 Tons of Rice for Cyclone-Struck Myanmar Delta

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YANGON, Myanmar (AP) — The United States donated 16,000 tons of rice to cyclone victims in Myanmar's Irrawaddy delta where a humanitarian crisis persists nearly a year after the disaster, the U.S. Embassy in Yangon said Friday.

The rice donation is part of $75 million in assistance from the U.S. for victims of Cyclone Nargis, which laid waste to much of the delta in May last year. The cyclone left 140,000 people dead or missing and destroyed much of the region's agriculture-based economy.

The donation "illustrates how U.S. assistance can help respond to the humanitarian crisis which is far from over for many people in the hardest hit areas of the Irrawaddy Delta," Larry Dinger, U.S. charge d'affaires in Yangon, said in a statement.