U.S. diplomat: Cyclone toll could be 100,000

'Major logistical challenge'
"With all those dead mostly floating in the water at this point you can get some idea of the conditions facing the teams on the ground. It's a major logistical challenge," Horsey said.

The U.S. military has put people and airplanes into position to work on any relief effort, as officials awaited word on whether the Asian nation would accept American help.

Villarosa did not sound optimistic.

"It's a very paranoid regime," she said. "They are very paranoid about the United States."

Experts say Myanmar's ruling military must overcome their distrust of the outside world and open up to a full-scale international relief operation. Horsey said the government "recognizes this is an unprecedented emergency" that needed international involvement.

France suggested invoking a U.N. "responsibility to protect" clause without waiting for military approval to deliver aid. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told reporters on Wednesday the idea was being discussed at the United Nations.

The United Nations recognized that concept in 2005 to protect civilians, even if intervention violates national sovereignty.

Water purification tablets, plastic sheeting, basic medical kits, bed nets and food were priorities, U.N. officials said.

Most of the victims were swept away by a wall of water from the cyclone that smashed into coastal towns and villages in the rice-growing delta southwest of the biggest city of Yangon.

Military helicopters dropped food and water on Wednesday to survivors in the Irrawaddy delta, where entire villages have been washed away, officials said.

State television on Wednesday quoted Yangon official Gen. Tha Aye as reassuring people that the situation was "returning to normal" in certain areas of Karen state that were hit by the cyclone. He was shown thanking volunteers and visiting the village of Naungbo, outside Yangon, where locals were cutting apart downed trees and brush to clear the roads.

But nearby in Yangon, Myanmar's biggest city, cyclone victims faced new challenges as markets doubled the price of rice, charcoal and bottled water. Electricity was restored to a small portion of the city's 6.5 million residents, but most, who rely on electric wells, had no water.

At a morning market in the Yangon suburb of Kyimyindaing, a fish monger shouted to shoppers: "Come, come the fish is very fresh."

But an angry woman snapped back: "Even if the fish is fresh, I have no water to cook it!"

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