(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-12-23 19:27

DHAKA, Bangladesh - More than 1 million people who survived Tropical Cyclone Sidr are in need of basic shelter five weeks after it slammed into Bangladesh and killed more than 3,300 people, the Red Cross said.

The November 15 cyclone destroyed or damaged more than 1.5 million houses, and there has been a serious shortfall of funds to address these needs, said a statement by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies received Sunday.

"The resilience and rapid rebuilding capacity of communities has been impressive," said Graham Saunders, head of the federation's shelter department in Geneva. "But hundreds of thousands of families still face the approaching winter with little more for shelter than reclaimed and often damaged building materials."

Bangladesh has sought US$2 billion (euro1.4 billion) in foreign aid to rebuild the cyclone-ravaged coast in the southwest. Overseas donors and aid agencies have pledged only US$470 million (euro320 million) in aid so far, the government said.

Sidr was the worst weather-related disaster to hit Bangladesh since another powerful cyclone killed about 148,000 people in Bangladesh in 1991.

Crops destroyed by Sidr could have produced nearly 1 million tons of rice in this impoverished nation of 140 million people.