Foreign diplomats said Foreign Minister Nyan Win acknowledged the possibility of the high casualty figure at a Monday briefing given to them and representatives of UN and international aid agencies.

State radio earlier reported that the official death toll from Saturday's Cyclone Nargis had risen to 3,939 from an original count of 351.

The diplomats, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the meeting was held behind closed doors, said the foreign minister acknowledged 59 deaths in the country's largest city of Yangon.

UN and private aid agencies say they are rushing to prepare assistance for victims of a devastating cyclone in Myanmar.

Relief agency representatives have been meeting in Yangon, Myanmar, as well in Bangkok, Thailand, and Geneva to assess the damage and prepare supplies.

UN agencies are working with the Red Cross and other organizations to see how it can help those affected by the cyclone.

Unicef spokeswoman Veronique Taveau says the UN children's agency alone has five teams assessing the situation in the country.

A further 2,129 people were officially listed as missing the state radio said, adding tens of thousands more may have been killed in the remote towns of Bogalay and Labutta in the Ayeyawaddy (Irrawaddy) delta.

Hundreds of thousands of people have been left without shelter and drinking water in military-ruled Myanmar after the devastating cyclone tore through the Irrawaddy delta, a United Nations official said on Monday.

'We know that it's several hundred thousand needing shelter and clean drinking water, but how many hundred thousand we just don't know,' Mr Richard Horsey, of the United Nations disaster response office in Bangkok, said.

Tropical Cyclone Nagris has killed more than 350 people and destroyed thousands of homes in Myanmar, state-run media said. Some dissident groups worried that the country's military government would be reluctant to ask for international help.

In the meantime, all international and domestic flights through Myanmar's Yangon International Airport will resume on Monday, the State Radio reported in a night broadcast on Sunday.

The planned resumption of the flights was announced after repair was made on some of the damaged airport infrastructure caused by a violent cyclone Nargis that swept Yangon on Saturday.

Besides, some of the waterway transport had resumed earlier on Sunday, the report said.

The disaster hit at a delicate time for the junta, less than a week ahead of a crucial referendum on a new constitution.

The military government said Saturday?s referendum on a new constitution intended to usher in democracy would go ahead, but with food prices tripling and water supplies cut, residents said they had more pressing problems.

But the junta, based in the remote new capital of Naypyidaw, insisted 'the entire people of the country are eagerly looking forward' to the referendum, the New Light of Myanmar newspaper reported.

Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's house in Yangon, were she is under house arrest, was damaged but the Nobel peace laureate was unhurt, a Myanmar official told AFP.

Some in Yangon complained the 400,000-strong military was doing little to help victims after Saturday's storm.

'Where are all those uniformed people who are always ready to beat civilians?' a trishaw driver, who refused to be identified for fear of retribution, said on Sunday. 'They should come out in full force and help clean up the areas and restore electricity.'

Myanmar, also known as Burma, has been under military rule since 1962. Its government has been widely criticised for human rights abuses and suppression of pro-democracy parties.

Last September, at least 31 people were killed and thousands more were detained when the military cracked down on peaceful protests led by Buddhist monks and democracy advocates.

The Forum for Democracy in Burma and other dissident groups outside of Myanmar urged the military junta Sunday to allow aid groups to operate freely in the wake of the cyclone - something it has been reluctant to do in the past.

It would be difficult for other countries to help unless they received a request from Myanmar's military rulers.

'International expertise in dealing with natural disasters is urgently required. The military regime is ill-prepared to deal with the aftermath of the cyclone,' said Mr Naing Aung, secretary general of the Thailand-based forum.

The storm's 120 mph winds blew the roofs off hospitals and cut electricity to the country's largest city.

Ms Shari Villarosa, the top American diplomat in Yangon, said the storm's whipping winds and torrential downpour had caused 'major devastation throughout the city.'

'The Burmese are saying they have never seen anything like this, ever,' Ms Villarosa said.

'Trees are down. Electricity lines are down. Our Burmese staff have lost their roofs.'

At least 351 people were killed, including 162 who lived on Haing Gyi island off the country's southwest coast, military-run Myaddy television station reported. Many of the others died in the low-lying Irrawaddy delta.

'The Irrawaddy delta was hit extremely hard not only because of the wind and rain but because of the storm surge,' said Mr Chris Kaye, the UN's acting humanitarian coordinator in Yangon.

'The villages there have reportedly been completely flattened.'

State television reported that in the Irrawaddy's Labutta township, 75 per cent of the buildings had collapsed.

The UN planned to send teams on Monday to assess the damage, Mr Kaye said. Initial assessment efforts had been hampered by roads clogged with debris and downed phone lines, he said. -- AP, AFP, REUTERS