More than a week after Cyclone Nargis hit Burma, Australia has finally managed to fly 31 tonnes of emergency supplies into the cyclone-ravaged nation.

The delay is due to Burma's ruling military junta's continued rejection of international assistance, which prompted Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to label the repressive regime "callous".

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About 100,000 people are feared dead and at least 1.5 million have been left homeless by the cyclone which hit southern Burma more than a week ago.

The military junta has earned international condemnation for locking the entry of foreign emergency relief workers into the reclusive country.

Most offers of international experts have been rebuffed although the junta is allowing in supplies on the condition it carries out the distribution of goods.

"It has been appallingly difficult to get assistance into Burma and once in, to have any guarantee of its proper distribution," Mr Rudd told parliament.

"The response of the regime in Burma to this crisis has been absolutely callous and those paying the price for this callousness have been the long-suffering Burmese people."

Today a Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) C-17 cargo plane landed in Burma's largest city Rangoon with much-needed water containers, water purification tablets, bedding, blankets, tarpaulins and medical supplies.

Mr Rudd described it as modest progress.

"Some relief supplies from international donors is getting through, although is estimated to be only about one-tenth of what is needed," he said.

Mr Rudd confirmed the Australian supplies would be distributed by the Burmese authorities.

"We would have preferred it be distributed by the UN and by NGOs. That's not been possible," he said.
"In a crisis like this, you've got to deal with the cards you've got and that means working with the Burmese authorities."

There are growing concerns the new threat facing survivors comes from disease and starvation.

"The concern now is that a population that is already weak and vulnerable will face a very real risk of the spread of disease and starvation," Mr Rudd said.

"It is hard to get a clear picture of precisely the impact on the ground in Burma because of the attitude and posture adopted by the regime."

Robert Tickner, chief executive of Red Cross Australia, said reports coming through from staff on the ground were that the situation was very grave.

"The danger to the health of the people through not having safe drinking water, through not having emergency shelter and lack of food is imposing an enormous threat and disease very much looms over the affected communities," he told ABC radio.

"This is a huge and grave problem. I don't for a minute want to underestimate the mountain that we have to climb to reach some of those affected communities."

World Vision Australia chief Tim Costello, one of the first Australians to get a visa into Burma, says the situation is still desperate.

"This is an absolutely huge and horrifying level of devastation and human suffering," he told the Nine Network.
Australia has committed $25 million in aid, so far, split between United Nations projects and international aid agencies. The opposition has criticised the sum, unfavourably compared to the $1 billion it provided Indonesia after the 2004 tsunami.

But Mr Rudd said the Australian donation was the largest contribution from any country to date.

Australia will consider further contributions as the situation progresses.

"As the situation becomes clearer we'll consider further assistance, including for the reconstruction phase," Mr Rudd said.

40 percent of cyclone victims 'children'

Meanwhile, a leading charity says at least 40 per cent of those killed in Burma's cyclone were children and hundreds more have lost their parents.

Part of the reason for the cyclone's devastating toll on young people is simple demographics, with 40 per cent of Burma's population younger than 18, according to Save the Children spokesman Dan Collinson.

But children are also the least able to survive powerful winds and towering tidal waves sparked by Cyclone Nargis, Collinson said.

"To be honest it's highly likely to be more than 40 per cent, because children are less likely to withstand these kinds of storm surges," Mr Collinson told AFP.

"Children are that much more vulnerable."

"We've heard reports of 300 children living in a camp that have been separated" from their parents, said Kathryn Rowe, also of Save the Children.

"So they may have extended families there but they have been separated from their parents."

In the hardest-hit regions of the Irrawaddy delta, hungry and barefoot children dressed in rags have been left begging on roadsides.

AFP reporters have seen children trying to catch fish and crabs in muddy canals, surrounded by the bloated corpses of the dead.

Many anguished parents there told AFP that they have nothing but coconuts and bananas to feed their children. With no substantial meals, young survivors are beginning to weaken and fall ill.

The United Nations estimates that one fifth of children living in the disaster zone are now suffering from diarrhoea. Without access to clean drinking water, diarrhoea can prove lethal in emergencies such as this.

Thousands of children have found shelter in temporary relief camps with access to only scant supplies of rice and just a few toilets between them.

The UN children's fund UNICEF says 3,000 schools were wiped out by the cyclone, leaving 500,000 children without classrooms as holidays are set to end early next month.

Burma braced for more rain

Survivors of the Burma cyclone are bracing themselves for further torrential rain.

Storm warnings have been issued for the region despite large swathes of the country still lying submerged under putrid floodwater from the initial cyclone.

Save the Children spokeswoman Kathryn Rawe said huge storms were expected to strike Burma.

Speaking from Thailand she said: "Storm warnings have been issued to last until May 15. It is feared that a month's worth of rain could fall in just two days.

"The storms are not expected to be on the same scale as the cyclone, but it's going to make bad conditions 100 times worse.

"People already displaced by the previous cyclone are going to be left without any shelter."

She said that up to 5,000 square kilometres of the country still lay under water.