10,000 feared dead in cyclone

DHAKA, Nov. 19: Up to 10,000 people are feared dead and millions homeless in cyclone-hit Bangladesh, officials said yesterday, as the army and aid workers battled to reach the country's devastated coast. Three days after Cyclone Sidr tore into one of the world’s poorest nations from the Bay of Bengal, rescue workers were still fighting their way through a landscape of flattened villages and traumatised crowds.

"We have already identified 2,750 bodies. Based on our experience in the past and reports from the scene, I would suggest the death toll may be as high as 10,000," said Prof M Abdur Rob, chairman of the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society, told the press in city yesterday.Shell-shocked survivors and rescuers yesterday picked through the cyclone ruins in the worst-hit southern districts as thousands of victims awaited relief amid their wrecked homes, crops, livestock and fields.

They sobbed in agony, suffered in hunger, thirst and diarrhoea. They buried dear ones and searched in vain for the answer why fate conspired against them.

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