Britain would support unilateral humanitarian intervention in Burma if the military government’s refusal to accept foreign aid for the victims of Cyclone Nargis results in epidemics and widespread deaths, Lord Malloch-Brown, the Foreign Office Minister, told The Times yesterday.

Lord Malloch-Brown was in Rangoon, the former Burmese capital, as part of an international effort to break the deadlock which has left many of the 2.5 million victims of the cyclone bereft of food, shelter, fresh water and medical care. The United Nations’ humanitarian chief, Sir John Holmes, arrived in the city last night and Ban Ki Moon, the UN Secretary-General, will also travel to Burma this week to make the case for an aid operation fronted by SouthEast Asian nations, India and China, but containing a strong UN component.

But Britain has not ruled out supporting action under the terms of the UN’s 2005 New York declaration, which sets out the “responsibility to protect” populations from crimes against humanity using “appropriate diplomatic, humanitarian and other peaceful means”. In a radio interview on Saturday, Gordon Brown referred to the possibility of unilaterally dropping international aid to stricken areas of the Irrawaddy delta, where as many as 129,000 people are believed to have died a fortnight ago.

“As far as air drops are concerned we rule nothing out, and the reason we rule nothing out, is that we want to get the aid directly to the people,” Mr Brown told the BBC.

Asked under what circumstances Britain would invoke the responsibility to protect, Lord Malloch-Brown said: “How do we define if it [the plan for Asian-led aid] isn’t working? If there are massive outbreaks of disease and secondary deaths, or if it gums up and no aid is delivered.” Western governments and international aid organisations appear to have accepted that the solution they would have liked to bring to Burma – a massive humanitarian aid operation by western NGOs under UN leadership, such as the one mounted in Aceh, Indonesia, after the 2004 tsunami – is out of the question. The generals who rule Burma know full well the contempt with which they are regarded in the West, and view its aid workers, especially from the former coloniser, Britain, as a Trojan Horse that could undermine even further their legitimacy in the eyes of their own people.

Instead, they are being offered a face-saving compromise in which India, China and the members of the Association of SouthEast Asian Nations (Asean) would work with the UN. “They’re not going to agree to a lot of British and American aid workers fanning out across the delta,” Lord Malloch-Brown said after meetings with a series of Burmese ministers. “We’ve got an emerging model where the likes of us will work within a framework, led by Asean, other Asian nations and the UN.

“The price of recognising historical suspicions and the political past is that it won’t allow direct Western aid to be delivered to a village by a Brit, for example. [For the Burmese Government], the price of us accepting that has to be a strong UN operation.”

That the junta has accepted a visit from Ban Ki Moon may suggest a willingness to compromise. “I hope a corner has been turned and that we’re moving into positive territory,” Lord Malloch-Brown said. “I hope that we have found a solution.”

But the offer of a cooperative aid operation is being reinforced by the threat of the alternative – a unilateral aid operation enforced by a foreign armada which is discreetly assembling off the coast. The French ship Le Mistral arrived in international waters on Saturday carrying 1,000 tons of aid for 15,000 people. The frigate HMS Westminster is also in the region, carrying helicopters rather than supplies, as well as the American USS Essex.

All three governments insist that they come in peace to offer aid and logistical support for an aid operation to disaster victims, many of whom are accessible only by boat or by air.

The regime’s paranoia is believed to be one of the factors which led it to relocate from Rangoon in 2005 to the new jungle capital of Naypyidaw. A few US Air Force aircraft have landed at Rangoon with supplies, but Western officials acknowledge that the chances of permission for a foreign military presence in the delta are slim.

Times Recommends

• It’s only Brits who don’t appreciate me, says Blair
• Party’s over for Greek graspers
• White House tightens security for Xmas marathon