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100,000 Burmese Now Feared Dead
Tally doesn't include prisoners Burmese junta might have shot after storm hit
By Sam Gale Rosen
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Posted May 7, 08 1:34 PM CDT
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(Newser)
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The death toll from Burma's catastrophic cyclone could reach 100,000, a US diplomat said today. That's almost five times what the nation's government had estimated, CNN reports—and aid workers are still waiting in Thailand, to be allowed into the country to help the estimated million hungry and homeless survivors.
Meanwhile, the Daily Telegraph reports, some 36 prisoners might have been shot dead by the ruling junta after the storm hit. Soldiers are said to have opened fire into a crowd when inmates rioted at the Insein Prison in Rangoon, described by former residents as “the darkest hell-hole in Burma."