France's ambassador to the United Nations, Jean-Maurice Ripert, has warned that the tragedy in Burma is turning slowly to a real risk of crimes against humanity.
He said the situation is unacceptable now as people are dying not because of Cyclone Nargis, but because Burmese authorities refuse to authorise international aid.
Burma state television has put the latest toll at 77,738 dead and 55,917 missing from the cyclone, which hit the country on 2 May, wiping away entire villages and submerging swathes of land under flood waters.
The figures are nearly double those released yesterday.
Meanwhile, dozens of Asian doctors have headed into Burma to treat survivors of the cyclone, the country's worst natural disaster.
They are the biggest group of foreigners so far allowed in to help cyclone victims but international aid agencies say that, with 2.5 million needy survivors, a greater and faster relief effort is desperately needed.
Burmese officials also took a group of foreign diplomats to tour the Irrawaddy delta, the hardest-hit region in the impoverished country's rice-growing south, where the junta has blocked outsiders from entering.
But diplomats held little hope they would see the most devastated regions, where reporters say corpses still lie in rice fields while thousands of people huddle in schools and Buddhist temples, still waiting for help.
