Relief for Nepal quake victims held up, death toll climbs to 7000

The Nepali government has come under fire for holding up vital relief supplies for survivors of the earthquake in Nepal in remote areas as the death toll from the disaster passed 7,000.

Nepali police has also pulled out the bodies of about 50 people, including some foreign trekkers, from an avalanche-hit area. None of the bodies have bean identified. Around 200 other people are feared dead as they are still unaccounted for. 

Meanwhile, eight days after the devastating earthquake, aid has not yet reached remote villages, with the United Nations and NGOs warning the government to loosen customs restrictions to deal with the increasing flow of relief material pouring in from abroad.

"They should not be using peacetime customs methodology," the U.N. representative Jamie McGoldrick said. Instead, he argued, all relief material should get a blanket exemption from checks on arrival.

Material was piling up at the Kathmandu airport instead of being ferried out to victims, McGoldrick said, while local media said hundreds of tonnes of vital supplies have been stopped at the Indian border.

But the government, complaining it has received unneeded supplies such as tuna and mayonnaise, insisted its customs agents had to check all emergency shipments.

Nepal lifted import taxes on tarpaulins and tents on Friday but a home ministry spokesman, Laxmi Prasad Dhakal, said all goods coming in from overseas had to be inspected. "This is something we need to do," he said.

Nepali government officials have said efforts to step up the pace of delivery of relief material to remote areas were also frustrated by a shortage of supply trucks and drivers, many of whom had returned to their villages to help their families.

The death toll in the disaster has now reached 7,040, with the number of injured climbing to 14,123. Hundreds of thousands of homeless, including many injured, have yet to be reached, while more than 130,000 houses were destroyed in the quake, according to the UN humanitarian office.

The UN has estimated the quake affected 8.1 million people, more than a quarter of Nepal’s population of 27.8 million.

Many Nepalis have been sleeping in the open since the quake, with survivors afraid to return to their homes because of powerful aftershocks. Tents have been pitched in Kathmandu's main sports stadium and on its golf course.

The United Nations said 8 million of Nepal's 28 million people were affected, with at least 2 million needing tents, water, food and medicines over the next three months.

The top priorities now are getting aid and shelter to people before the monsoon season starts within weeks and adds to the difficulty in distributing relief supplies, World Food Programme executive director Ertharin Cousin told Reuters.

"Our fear is the monsoon will come early," she said.

Disease is also a worry. "Hospitals are overflowing, water is scarce, bodies are still buried under the rubble and people are still sleeping in the open," Rownak Khan, UNICEF's deputy representative in Nepal, said in a statement.

"This is a perfect breeding ground for diseases."