Strong earthquake strikes northern Myanmar; bridge, gold mine collapse, about 12 feared dead

By Associated Press, Published: November 10 | Updated: Sunday, November 11, 5:44 AM Source：http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/magnitude-66-earthquake-strikes-northern-myanmar-no-injuries-immediately-reported/2012/11/10/a99fb4d6-2ba3-11e2-aaa5-ac786110c486_story.html YANGON, Myanmar — A strong earthquake of magnitude-6.8 struck northern Myanmar on Sunday, collapsing a bridge and a gold mine, damaging several old Buddhist pagodas and leaving as many as 12 people feared dead.

A slow release of official information left the actual extent of the damage unclear after Sunday morning’s strong quake. Myanmar has a poor official disaster response system, despite having lost upwards of 140,000 people to a devastating cyclone in 2008. Myanmar’s second-biggest city of Mandalay reported no casualties or major damage as the nearest major population center to the main quake Mandalay lies about 117 kilometers (72 miles) south of the quake’s epicenter near the town of Shwebo. The U.S. Geological Society reported a 5.8-magnitude aftershock later Sunday, but there were no initial reports of new damage or casualties. Smaller towns closer to the main quake’s epicenter were worse-hit. A report late Sunday on state television MRTV said 100 homes, some government buildings and a primary school were damaged in the Thabeikyin, a town known for gold mining not far from the epicenter. It put the latest casualty toll from the quake at four dead, 53 injured and four missing, a death toll lower than independently compiled tallies of around a dozen. An official from Myanmar’s Meteorological Department said the magnitude-6.8 quake struck at 7:42 a.m. local time. The area surrounding the epicenter is underdeveloped, and casualty reports were coming in piecemeal, mostly from local media. The region is a center for mining of minerals and gemstones, and several mines were reported to have collapsed. The biggest single death toll was reported by a local administrative officer in Sintku township — on the Irrawaddy River near the quake’s epicenter — who told The Associated Press that six people had died there and another 11 were injured. He said some of the dead were miners who were killed when a gold mine collapsed. He spoke on condition of anonymity because local officials are normally not allowed to release information to the media. Rumors circulated in Yangon of other mine collapses trapping workers, but none of the reports could be confirmed. According to news reports, several people died when a bridge under construction across the Irrawaddy River collapsed east of Shwebo. The bridge linked the town of Sintku, 65 kilometers (40 miles) north of Mandalay on the east bank of the Irrawaddy, with Kyaukmyaung on the west bank. The website of Weekly Eleven magazine said four people were killed and 25 injured when the bridge, which was 80 percent finished, fell. The local government announced a toll of two dead and 16 injured. All of the victims appeared to be workers. However, a Shwebo police officer, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said just one person was confirmed dead from the bridge’s collapse, while five were still unaccounted for.

US President Barack Obama to visit Burma

8 November 2012 BBC News Fresh from his election win, Barack Obama will this month become the first US president to visit Burma, the White House says.

He will meet President Thein Sein and opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. It is part of a three-leg tour from 17 to 20 November that will also take in Thailand and Cambodia. The government of Burma has begun implementing economic, political and other reforms, a process the Obama administration sought to encourage. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was previously the most senior US official to go to Burma when she visited in December 2011. 'Democratic transition' Mr Obama's Burma stop is part of a trip built around the summit of the Association of South East Asian Nations in Cambodia, which leaders from China, Japan and Russia will also attend. In a statement, White House spokesman Jay Carney said Mr Obama intended to "speak to civil society to encourage Burma's ongoing democratic transition". The BBC's David Bamford says the trip - Mr Obama's first foreign initiative since his re-election this week - reflects the importance that the US has placed on normalising relations with Burma. This process has moved forward relatively swiftly, our correspondent adds, and it represents an opportunity for the US to have a greater stake in the region and so at least partly counter the dominant influence of China. Reforms have been taking place in Burma since elections in November 2010 saw military rule replaced with a military-backed nominally civilian government. Since then many political prisoners have been freed and censorship relaxed. The party of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was released from years of house arrest after the elections, has rejoined the political process after boycotting the 2010 polls. It now has a small presence in parliament after a landslide win in by-elections in April. In response, the US has appointed a full ambassador to Burma and suspended sanctions. It is also set to ease its import ban on goods from Burma, a key part of remaining US sanctions. Human rights groups are likely to criticise Mr Obama's visit as premature, given that the ruling government has failed to prevent outbreaks of communal violence in the west of the country. Clashes between Buddhists and Muslims in Rakhine state have left more than 100,000 people - mostly members of the stateless Muslim Rohingya minority - displaced.