Aid workers battled today to get food and water to desperate cyclone survivors in Burma, whose government is under fire after more than 22,000 people died in one of Asia's worst natural disasters.
More than 41,000 people are also missing, but the United Nations said foreign staff were still awaiting visas from the secretive military regime - which said outside aid workers needed to "negotiate" to enter the country.
"Let the United States come to help you," said US President George W Bush, leading international calls to let in foreign relief teams.
Tropical cyclone Nargis barrelled early on Saturday into the south-west coast of Burma, one of the poorest nations on the planet.
UN officials said they were still unable to assess the full extent of the devastation wrought by the storm, especially in the worst-hit Irrawaddy delta region, where entire towns were washed away.
At UN headquarters in New York, Rashid Khalikov of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs pleaded with the junta to open its borders to foreign aid.
"We cannot tell you are how many people are in need of assistance ... It probably will be in the hundreds of thousands," he told reporters.
"We are trying to get maximum cooperation from the government in terms of visas and customs regulations. We really hope it will happen very quickly. We applied for visas. We have not got the visas."
The UN's World Food Program began doling out emergency rice in Rangoon, the largest city and former capital, and the first batch of more than $US10 million ($A10.53 million) worth of foreign aid arrived from Thailand. But a lack of specialised equipment slowed distribution.
Despite the magnitude of the disaster - the most devastating cyclone to hit Asia since 1991, when 143,000 people died in Bangladesh - France said the ruling generals in the former Burma were still placing too many conditions on aid.
"The United Nations is asking the Burmese government to open its doors. The Burmese government replies: 'Give us money, we'll distribute it.' We can't accept that," Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told parliament.
Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith today announced an immediate $3 million in aid, to be evenly divided between aid agencies such as CARE, World Vision and Caritas, the UN's World Food Program, and UNICEF.
"Our contribution is aimed at the things which we're advised, and which our own ambassador told me last night, were the key priorities, which is water purification, shelter, food and basic things like mosquito nets to try and prevent the spread of malaria," Mr Smith told ABC Radio.
He also again urged the Burmese military regime to cooperate with aid agencies.
CARE Australia, which has operated in parts of Burma for 14 years, says the regime has so far been supportive of their efforts to provide emergency shelter, food, water and other essentials.
"Every indication that we have at the moment is that we've been receiving full cooperation from the government authorities in Myanmar (Burma)," CARE Australia spokesman Robert Yallop told the Nine Network.
Satellite images from US space agency NASA showed virtually the entire coastal plain of the country under water.
Video footage of the disaster zone showed flattened villages, smashed bridges, and survivors forced to live out in the open.
