World Bank refuses loan to Myanmar

YANGON, Myanmar, May 20 (UPI) -- The World Bank is refusing to loan money to cyclone-ravaged Myanmar, saying the country has been in arrears with the bank since 1998, bank officials said.

Representatives of The World Bank will attend a donor conference organized by the United Nations and the Association of South-East Asian Nations, but "cannot legally provide any resources," the bank's Managing Director Juan Jose Daboub told Ihe Daily Telegraph newspaper in London.

Myanmar's ruling military junta has provided assistance to only 20 percent of the cyclone's 2.5 million survivors who are in desperate need of food, water and shelter, the report said.

Beggars line the streets along roads in the Irrawaddy Delta, but the government has distributed newspapers asking motorists not to help, as it will "make them lazy and dependent on others," the Telegraph reported Tuesday.

The military government has also blocked foreign aid, fearing it will undermine their authority, the report said.