First Lady Blames 22,500 Deaths on Burma Gov.

UPDATE: According to Reuters, the death toll now stands at 22,500, with 41,000 missing. According to WikiPedia, this would be the deadliest cyclone (hurricane) worldwide since the 1991 Bangladesh Cyclone.

VIDEO SCRIPT: (click here to download video) The death toll in Myanmar practically un-imaginable. The weekend cyclone killed at least twenty-thousand people and that number could rise. Up to a million people are likely homeless, some villages virtually leveled and huge rice-growing areas wiped out. ABC's Viviana Hurtado has the latest. Includes CNN, MRTV, DVB, BBC, MWB & al Jazeera footage.

ORIGINAL POST:

First Lady Laura Bush today blamed the 10,000+ deaths from Cyclone Nargis in Burma (Myanmar) on the government there, saying that those who knew the storm was coming relied on foreign media outlets.

On the web, the Myanmar's Department of Meteorology & Hydrology appeared to be a modern weather website including streaming video, but listed no High Wind, Heavy Rain, or Flood Warnings for 2008. The site was not in English however, and I could not find a location for Cyclone Warnings. The site showed the most recent weather map as April 29th and the nav choice "Latest News" resulted in a website server error.

A bicycle taxi driver moves along through a damaged area of Yangon, Sunday, May 4, 2008, following cyclone Nargis. The death toll from a devastating cyclone has risen to almost 4,000, a Myanmar state radio station has said. The radio station broadcasting from the country's capital Naypyitaw said Monday that almost 3,000 more people are unaccounted for in a single town in the country's low-lying Irrawaddy River delta area. (AP Photo/Barry Broman)

A bicycle taxi driver moves along through a damaged area of Yangon, Sunday, May 4, 2008, following cyclone Nargis. Myanmar's foreign minister acknowledged in a briefing today that the death toll from the devastating cyclone could reach as high as 10 thousand (10,000), while hundreds of thousands could be homeless. AF radio station broadcasting from the country's capital Naypyitaw said Monday that almost 3,000 more people are unaccounted for in a single town in the country's low-lying Irrawaddy River delta area. (AP Photo/Barry Broman)