Rice visits China quake zone

She stopped in Dujiangyan, a badly hit city of 250,000, where officials said 3,000 people died and 90% of the buildings were now uninhabitable.

“My goodness,” she said as she surveyed a pile of rubble – once a gym - before heading to a community of thousands of temporary homes and a water purification facility run by an American charity.

“I can see that the Chinese government and officials have been attentive,” Rice told reporters after the tour.

“I can see how much effort has gone into the recovery. But with a disaster of this magnitude, no one can do it alone.”

“We are very glad that the Chinese people have reached out for help,” she added.

Rice said China’s efforts contrasted with that of Burma’s ruling junta, which faced worldwide criticism after Cyclone Nargis on May 2-3 for failing to speed aid to survivors and initially barring foreign aid workers from the hardest-hit Irrawaddy delta.

Two weeks after the cyclone slammed into the area, the reclusive regime authorised the UN to use 10 helicopters inside the country.

The government’s official death toll this week reached more than 84,500.

“It has been sad that ... instead of making possible the international community’s response to their people, that they have put up barriers to that response,” Rice said.

“Many lives could have been saved and many more could still be saved if we can get that response,” she said. “This is not a matter of politics.”

Grieving parents in Dujiangyan, about an hour’s drive from the provincial capital of Chengdu, have tried to file a lawsuit demanding compensation along with an explanation and apology from the government for the large number of students killed. But officials refused to accept their papers.

School collapses have become one of the most charged issues in the earthquake recovery process. On the one-month anniversary of the quake, hundreds of parents of children killed in a school in hard-hit Beichuan staged a protest.

Rice’s visit today without incident.

At the camp of temporary homes, she spoke to parents of a young boy.

“I wish you the very best,” she said. “I’m sorry you lost so much but I know you are going to recover. You have a great spirit.”

The community, one of hundreds that have sprung up across the quake zone, had about 7,000 white-and-blue prefabricated homes and officials said the number could grow to about 25,000.

Later today, Rice is scheduled to fly to Beijing to meet with President Hu Jintao, Premier Wen Jiabao and Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi.

Meetings will likely focus on North Korea’s destruction on Friday of its nuclear reactor cooling tower at the Yongbyon facility – the end of the first phase of the regime’s denuclearisation process – and what the next step will be.

So far, the United States and other countries have agreed to give the North the equivalent of one million tons of oil for disabling Yongbyon, its main nuclear facility, and providing a list of nuclear programs.

On Thursday, Pyongyang presented a 60-page accounting of its nuclear activities. The declaration triggered an announcement from US President George Bush that he was moving to ease some sanctions on the North.

North Korea has 45 days to agree on procedures to verify its declaration, and the United States plans to remove the country from a State Department list of state sponsors of terrorism within the same period.

The next, and far more complicated, phase of the disarmament process is for the North to abandon and dismantle its nuclear weapons programs. So far, the other countries involved in six-nation negotiations – China, Japan, South Korea and Russia – have not said what they will give the North in exchange for doing so.

China is Rice’s last stop on a June 23-30 tour that also took her to Germany, Japan and South Korea.