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THAILAND opened a natural disaster warning centre today, five months after the devastating tsunami killed more than 5300 people on its southern coast.

'It takes them 15 minutes to send out warnings, more than enough time to warn people of a coming tsunami,' Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said as the Natural Disaster Warning Centre opened live on television from a northern suburb of Bangkok.

Although the tsunami warning system was not yet complete because it still required sea buoys to measure a tsunami's impact, it would be effective for now, Mr Thaksin said.

The centre, supplied with 30 million baht ($986,000) worth of communication equipment from a group of American software firms, is crammed with computer screens and linked to earthquake centres in Japan and Hawaii, Mr Thaksin said.

The centre, which would issue alerts on other natural disasters such as floods, forest fires, and hazardous chemical leaks, will receive and analyse earthquake information from provincial meteorological offices across the country.

If it believed a tsunami was coming, a warning would be sent to all television channels, radio stations and mobile phones by text messages, officials said.

Last month, Mr Thaksin attended Thailand's first tsunami evacuation drill on the beaches of Phuket, one of Asia's premier tourist resorts, which involved navy helicopters, ships, and three warning towers which blared warnings.

Fifty more towers would be completed soon and the Thai centre was ready to share information with other countries if a tsunami was expected, he said.

Thailand's official death toll from the Indian Ocean disaster stands at 5395.

A further 2822 people are listed as missing.

Source: Australian - Australia

Tsunami 5 months on: Tsunami is Oxfam's biggest ever aid effort

The scale of the Tsunami's destruction and the enormous public response has made the tsunami aid effort the largest in Oxfam's history, according to Oxfam's first quarterly report on its response published today.

The report reveals that in the first three months of the response, Oxfam helped over one million people and funds available to the organization now exceed US$250 million, making this the biggest response in Oxfam's history. Oxfam's assistance has ranged from providing hygiene kits to survivors in Indonesia during the immediate aftermath of the disaster to supporting the reconstruction of new homes in Sri Lanka.

'For once the scale of the response reflects the scale of the disaster and what we have been able to accomplish so far has only been possible thanks to the unprecedented generosity of ordinary people around the world,' said Jeremy Hobbs, Executive Director of Oxfam International.

The quarterly report also includes Oxfam's five-year spending strategy to finance the largest humanitarian effort in its history. Oxfam's Tsunami Fund will spend US$ 250 million over the next five years on 'reconstruction plus' across seven tsunami-affected countries.

'Our long-term reconstruction program aims to give people the chance of building something better than the poverty that existed before the tsunami,' added Hobbs.

Oxfam International has set up a specific Tsunami Fund to coordinate program work, and to ensure accountability to the public who can see how funds are being used.

At the end of March, Oxfam International had spent over US$26.6 million across seven tsunami-affected countries. Almost 95 per cent of Oxfam International's Tsunami Fund will be spent directly on Oxfam's humanitarian programs which have saved thousands of lives and are already helping more than a million people fulfill their basic needs, helping them get back to work and rebuild their communities. This year, Oxfam plans to spend US$80million.

"We've published our full figures today so that the public who donated so generously know that their money is saving and rebuilding lives. This is our biggest aid effort ever and we want people to know we are accountable both to the donors and to the beneficiaries," said Jeremy Hobbs, Executive Director of Oxfam International.

Although the reconstruction phase will take time, Oxfam is making significant progress. In Sri Lanka, for example, Oxfam International is already assisting 430,000 people and has spent US$9,800,000 providing life-saving water and sanitation and helping people to get back to work and rebuild their communities. More than 22,600 men and women have benefited from Oxfam's cash-for-work and livelihoods programs and 400 children have received the materials they need to return to school.

In Indonesia, Oxfam International has already reached 139,000 people. Community-led cash-for-work programs have paid almost 30,000 men for clearing villages and draining seawater from agricultural lands, planting mangrove seedlings and building community houses. Oxfam is already helping 520,000 people across south India and has spent US$5 million of its five-year budget helping people recover from the tsunami.

"Despite the grief and loss this disaster has caused, reconstruction can provide opportunities to alleviate poverty and restore dignity. It's important, psychologically, for families to be able to plan and look to the future. Oxfam's shelter and livelihood programs are helping families recover by involving them in key decisions about their future," added Hobbs.

Source: Medical News Today - UK

Monday, May 30, 2005

Praises post-tsunami work in T.N.

The former U.S. President, Bill Clinton, on Saturday lauded the post-tsunami reconstruction work in Tamil Nadu and said he was 'impressed' with the efforts taken to restore water supply and sanitation and self-help initiatives in the State.

'Women are now making products that they had never dreamt of before,' Mr. Clinton said in response to a question at a press conference on his comparison between the progress of post-tsunami work in Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka. 'They have done a really good job,' he said referring to the work done in Tamil Nadu for the Dalits and others affected by the tsunami. However, Mr. Clinton also emphasised that 'the two are not comparable,' and that 'each country has its own strong points.'

Citing the initiatives in Tamil Nadu, Mr. Clinton said he would be compiling the 'best practices' adopted in the tsunami-hit countries, which he would visit as a U.N. Special Envoy. 'We are collecting the good work done by each country so that they could be held as examples to others.'

Source: Hindu - Chennai,India

Clinton Cancels Visit to Tsunami-Hit Areas of Maldives

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton has canceled a scheduled visit to tsunami-hit areas of the Maldive Islands for reasons that are still not entirely clear.

Mr. Clinton is touring four Indian Ocean nations in his role as special United Nations envoy for tsunami relief. The former president arrived Saturday in the Maldives after visiting Sri Lanka.

He will have scheduled meetings in the capital, Male, with government officials and business leaders to discuss tsunami relief efforts.

One U.N. spokeswoman said Mr. Clinton, who had heart surgery last September, canceled his visit to the tsunami-hit areas because he is suffering from exhaustion. But others said the trip was called off because of poor weather in the area.

The former president will leave the Maldives later Sunday for Indonesia on the last leg of his tour.

Source: Voice of America - USA

Friday, May 27, 2005

U.S. researchers design tsunami-resistant house

U.S. researchers have designed a house they say is better able to withstand a tidal wave and are planning to build 1,000 of them in Sri Lanka, one of the countries hit by last year's deadly tsunami.

Carlo Ratti, a teacher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was at a wedding in Sri Lanka when the tsunami struck the region last December. When he returned to MIT, he worked on the design of the 'tsunami-safe(r) house' with colleagues at his school, Harvard University and British engineering firm Buro Happold.

'The goal was low-tech construction with high-tech design,' Ratti, a civil engineer who heads MIT's SENSEable City Laboratory, told Reuters on Thursday.

'We came up with a design that is five times stronger than traditional (Sri Lankan) houses.'

SENSEable and the Prajnopaya Foundation, a Buddhist nonprofit group, plan to build about 1,000 of the houses in Sri Lanka. Using the same type of materials typically used in the construction of traditional Sri Lankan homes, the more robust structures consist of four reinforced concrete pillars supporting a tin or tile roof.

The open design is stronger, Ratti said, because it would not block the flow of water were another tsunami to hit.

'Four small cores are stronger than a big one,' he said.

The tsunami killed more than 180,000 people throughout Asia, with nearly 40,000 dead or presumed dead in Sri Lanka.

It devastated much of the island's coast and 100,000 people still live in makeshift shelters nearly five months later.

'The problem in Sri Lanka is the government wants to relocate people from the coast further inland,' Ratti said.

'This would come at a huge social, cultural, environmental and economic cost. So the aim of this project is to investigate technological strategies that could guarantee safety at lower cost," he said.

Each house would cost between $1,000 and $1,500 to build.

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Indian lower castes the worst sufferers after tsunami: HRW

Washington: Human Rights Watch said on Thursday that in the wake of the tsunami catastrophe the Indian government had failed to come to the rescue of lower-caste citizens who were discriminated against by those belonging to higher castes.

In a letter to former US Bill Clinton, now visiting Asia as the United Nations' special envoy on tsunami recovery, the group said he should speak out against reconstruction efforts that foster discrimination against vulnerable groups, in particular women and lower-caste people. The group charged that in the weeks after the tsunami, discrimination had been practised against Dalits by other victims of the tsunami, who belonged to a higher caste. In many instances, the Indian government failed to enforce its existing legislation and policy to protect vulnerable groups. It urged the New Delhi to undertake effective training and education - both for officials and the affected communities - as part of its disaster management strategy.

In a 47-page report, Human Rights Watch urged the Indian government to take steps to ensure that its proposed compensation and relocation schemes do not overlook tens of thousands of people who cannot easily document their economic and property claims. In particular, the most marginalised communities - those without effective local or political clout - are at risk of being ignored. Brad Adams of the Watch said, "India did not need international assistance for immediate relief but, in fact, dispatched help to its neighbors. But to be an effective model for other countries, India has to demonstrate greater protection of the human rights of its own citizens."

The report offered a set of recommendations to the Indian government, state and district administrations, voluntary groups and donor agencies, urging them to improve public education and law enforcement efforts to better combat caste-based discriminatory practices and fully implement the provisions of the law. It asked the Indian authorities to seek to restore a sustainable livelihood for all communities of fishermen by ensuring that fishermen have adequate access to the coastline, and have proper boats and implements necessary to resume their trade. They authorities were also asked to restore a sustainable livelihood for communities indirectly affected by the tsunami through such measures as creating compensation mechanisms that account for non-tangible assets, and providing alternate employment for daily wage labourers in local reconstruction efforts.

Human Rights Watch appealed to the Indian government to provide equitable distribution of resources without caste, gender, or religious prejudice, take adequate measures to meet the protection needs of women, children and the disabled, engage in consultations with local communities to prevent arbitrary or discriminatory relocation or any unreasonable denial of the option to return home and encourage cooperation among government officials, non-governmental organisations and donor agencies to prevent uneven or inefficient distribution of resources.

Source: Daily Times - Lahore,Pakistan

Thursday, May 26, 2005

Poverty tsunami: Wolfensohn departs with a stark warning

At his last media interview, James Wolfensohn, the outgoing president of the World Bank, offered an apocalyptic view of what would happen if world poverty and the lack of equity and social justice were not urgently addressed.

There would be a 'tsunami', a great wave of instability, he said, which would threaten world peace and cause great suffering around the globe.

The Australian-born former investment banker was nominated for the World Bank post by the former US president, Bill Clinton, and retires having been only the second president of the bank to serve two five-year terms. Poverty, he said, had 'consumed' him for the past decade. 'I believe we have made progress but I believe it has not been adequate,' he said. 'In the next 25 years, the world's population will grow by 2.5 billion and all but 50 million of these people will be in the developing world.

'Unless we look seriously at the issues of poverty and equity, the chances of stability on our planet are very remote.'

Mr Wolfensohn, who became an American citizen to improve his chances of winning the World Bank post, takes up his new job as an envoy to oversee the non-military aspects of Israel's withdrawal from Gaza.

He has already moved out of his office at the bank to make way for the new president, the US Assistant Defence Secretary, Paul Wolfowitz, but has left behind him an extensive collection of Australian art, including a number of Aboriginal paintings on the walls of his former suite.

At 71, the frenetic energy levels for which Mr Wolfensohn is well known seem undiminished, the broad Australian accent unchanged and the shock of unruly and raffishly long grey hair still as thick and out of control as ever.

There have been mixed reviews of Mr Wolfensohn's stint as World Bank president, but most observers agree he has been indefatigable in defending and expanding the bank's reach and influence.

With a fortune estimated at around $US350 million ($A460 million) amassed during his investment banking career, he is probably the richest public servant ever to run a development and aid organisation.

On leaving the bank he made an initial donation of $US1 million to establish a new centre of development at the Brookings Institution in Washington, with the promise of another $10 million over the next five years.

Mr Wolfenson has not always been a favourite of the Bush Administration and it is said that when he checked to see whether there would be support for him serving a third term at the bank, the message was clear - it was time to go.

His has consistently argued the US foreign aid budget is inadequate, that the imbalance between military spending and spending on development is too great. And his suggestion that poverty and hopelessness helps breed terrorism has annoyed many. He praised George Bush for his commitment of $US15 billion over five years to fight AIDS, but said much more needed to be done. "I don't see how we can continue to distort our spending," he said. "A thousand billion dollars around the world on military spending and around $60 billion on development is a huge imbalance. And we think we are dealing with the issue of peace."

Mr Wolfensohn said some progress had been made, but for about 500 million people living in non-performing states, the future looked dire. "Population will grow by a billion or a billion-and-a-half as we go forward and we just can't leave these people behind," he said. "Too many leaders in the developing world have not assumed that equity and social justice is at the core of their mandate. There are still too many corrupt rulers."

As for his successor, he has this advice: "I hope he'll be moderate in the changes because the bank is pretty strong. But I have faith in Paul Wolfowitz - I think he's motivated by the right instincts."

Mr Wolfenson's Middle East tenure is due to finish at the end of the year, and he will spend more time in Australia where he has family and a property near Wagga Wagga. "I've spent 38 hours and one night there in the past decade," he said. "I certainly expect to do better than that in the next 10 years."

Source: Sydney Morning Herald (subscription) - New South Wales,Australia

Non-tsunami aid lackluster, official says

The hugely successful worldwide campaign to send immediate aid to victims of last year's Indian Ocean tsunami has distracted donors from less-dramatic emergencies, the UN humanitarian chief said Tuesday.

While 85 percent of the UN appeal for relief to countries hit by December's tsunami has been covered, other emergencies have received much lower amounts, said Jan Egeland, head of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

'It's the slow onset disasters that are the problem, the droughts especially.'

He cited in particular Niger, Djibouti and the Central African Republic.'

Niger, one of the world's poorest countries, has been particularly hard hit by drought and a locust invasion 'of biblical proportions' and the agency's appeal for $16.2 million launched last week has received no contributions, Egeland said.

Source: Chicago Tribune - Chicago,IL,USA

Wednesday, May 25, 2005

SRI LANKA: MUSLIM PARTY FEARS EXCLUSION FROM AGREEMENT ON TSUNAMI AID

A Sri Lankan Muslim party fears that Muslims have been left out of Sri Lanka's president Chandrika Kumaratunga's plan to set up a joint mechanism to handle tsunami aid with the Tamil rebel group, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). The secretary of the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress, Hassen Ali, said on Monday that despite his party's leader Rauff Hakeem's meeting with Kumaratunga, the government had yet to give details of the proposed mechanism to his party.

Ali said the concerns regarding the mechanism's impact on Muslim-dominated areas had not been considered. A joint mechanism for tsunami relief work was proposed by the international donors.

More than 30,000 people died in Sri Lanka during the December tsunami. A million others were left homeless. Tamil majority areas in the north and east were among the worst affected and some of these areas in Sri Lanka are also Muslim dominated.

Muslims make up around 8 percent of Sri Lanka's population of 19 million, some 76 percent of whom are Buddhist.

Source: AKI - Rome,Italy

S.Lanka tsunami aid stuck on the ground

Aid money given to rebuild Sri Lanka after December's devastating Tsunami is getting held up on the ground, to the frustration of governments and donors, World Bank Vice President Praful Patel said in an interview.

At least $9 billion in private and official aid has been raised for countries battered by the tsunami in one of the biggest charitable fund-raising efforts in history. Donors have pledged $3 billion to Sri Lanka alone.

'There is impatience on the part of everybody, including the government and the donors, about the pace at which things are moving,' said Patel, who visited Sri Lanka last week for a meeting to plan the country's post tsunami reconstruction.

'The frustrations come from the fact that the pledges that were made and the money that was made available are not moving fast enough on the ground.'

Hitches included a government ban on building close to the shoreline, intended as a safety precaution, Patel said.

'People who are on the shoreline are still waiting for their plots to be allocated elsewhere, and there are issues with some of them not wanting to move because they have lived for hundreds of years on this location,' he said on Tuesday on the sidelines of a World Bank conference.

Earlier this month the U.N.'s emergency relief coordinator also said post-tsunami rebuilding in general had been too slow and frustration was growing among displaced people.

Patel said most pledges from international donors had been converted into real commitments, so funding was not the issue.

Donations have been so large that the head of the Sri Lanka's central bank has said the country might match or even beat last year's economic growth rate in spite of the disaster.

HUGE AID FLOW

The chairman of Sri Lanka's tsunami reconstruction agency said this month the country should get so much aid it can spend some on non-tsunami projects such as alleviating poverty and rehabilitating parts of the island damaged by war.

The tsunami killed more than 180,000 people, with nearly 40,000 dead or presumed dead in Sri Lanka. It devastated much of the island's coastline, and 100,000 people are still living in tents and makeshift shelters nearly five months later.

Patel said that the process of distributing the billions of aid dollars down to individuals could fuel corruption, but added that the government was committed to preventing this.

He said that the flood of aid money had also made life difficult for local non-governmental organisations, who were being crowded out by international newcomers.

More than a hundred NGOs set up offices in Sri Lanka shortly after the disaster, paying up to four times the local rate to attract staff, to the detriment of local groups, he said.

"Local NGOs were losing their staff, so their complaint was: instead of helping us to build capacity, they are actually weakening us," Patel said.

"When the immediate relief is done, the system cannot sustain these salaries, yet the expectations are changing."

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

Post-Tsunami Recovery Will Take a Decade

Tsunami sets damaged countries back ten years

Countries hit by last December's devastating tsunami around the Indian Ocean will take at least five to 10 years to recover with the help of international aid, United Nations agencies said on Monday.

Technical experts underlined after a meeting organised by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) that recovery efforts needed to tackle problems with poverty, conflicts or land disputes that existed before the tsunami struck, on top of reconstruction.

'You're very rarely talking about a process of less than five years and usually it's more like 10 years,' UNDP disaster recovery specialist Andrew Maskrey told journalists.

The UNDP cautioned that the region was in 'a critical stage of transition' that would determine the shape of reconstruction and said that it wanted to 'build back better, build back stronger'.

'We have to be careful of the tyranny of rush: trying to get things done quickly can actually put us behind in the long run,' said Kathleen Cravero of the UN's humanitarian coordination office (OCHA), adding that the process was 'well underway'.

The agency warned against rebuilding 'the conditions of risk' that existed before the disaster in the Indonesian province of Aceh, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the Maldives.

'Recovery, despite the horrific nature of the disaster, does provide an opportunity to build back better and address the development challenges that had been with these communities for quite some time,' Cravero said.

Housing would be improved, protected from recurrent natural disasters, backed by improved health and education services, and the effort would also try to ensure lower levels of malnutrition.

Aceh, the hardest hit area, suffered losses estimated at $4,5-billion, equivalent to the province's entire Gross Domestic Product (GDP), according to UNDP data.

The tsunami, which killed 128 645 people there, directly affected livelihoods by wiping out housing, trade, farming and fisheries.

In Thailand, 500 fishing villages were the most affected, while 120 000 people lost jobs in the tourism industry and about 6 800 homes were destroyed or damaged.

The tourism paradise of the Maldives suffered "stunning" damages in financial terms of 470-million-dollars (about R3-billion), nearly two-thirds of its annual economic output, the UNDP said.

Damage in Sri Lanka reached one billion dollars, leaving 516 000 displaced and in need of permanent shelter, while 100 000 homes were destroyed in some of the poorest parts of the country.

As the experts took stock of the shift from the declining emergency relief operation into the recovery phase, they said local and national authorities would increasingly be at the forefont of an ever more complex effort.

"There was one tsunami in Asia on December 26, but there is not one disaster," said Andrew Musgrave of UNDP.

"We cannot talk about a recovery process in the Indian Ocean, we have to talk about different recovery processes in each of the affected countries, and within these countries," he added.

Other challenges included coordination of all the actors involved, and financial transparency in using the billions of dollars in aid pledges that have been made in areas that were sometimes blighted by corruption.

Indonesia especially had been lowly rated in corruption assessments, an official pointed out.

"When you have seven billion dollars (about R45-billion) committed over the next five years, you can imagine how this problem could be aggravated," said Praveen Pardeshi, of the UN's disaster reduction unit.

Source: Independent Online - Cape Town,South Africa

Monday, May 23, 2005

Sri Lanka rides tsunami to keep economy afloat

International lenders downgraded Sri Lanka's economic growth forecasts for this year after tsunamis devastated its coastline, but the island is banking on a flood of foreign aid to keep its head above the water.

The balance of payments, which were in deficit to the tune of 205 million dollars last year, is expected to swing to surplus thanks to foreign cash inflows after the December 26 tsunami, the Central Bank of Sri Lanka says.

The rupee, which fell over 10 percent against the dollar last year, saw a big turnaround, gaining 5.2 percent in the first quarter of 2005 to become one of the world's best performing currencies.

Foreign reserves also improved to 3.54 billion dollars in March from 3.12 billion in November, official figures show.

'The tsunami has certainly given the country a new lease of life,' said Alastair Corera, country head of Fitch Ratings. 'The question now is how the restructuring of sectors that need attention will be carried out.'

International lenders have been pressing for reforms in the country's energy sector and privatisation of state enterprises, two areas where the Marxist-backed government has been slow to respond due to internal rifts.

'The debt deferment is not forever... the payments will kick in in about a year or two,' Corera said. 'If we don't have the reforms in place by then, the country is going to be in bigger trouble.'

Tsunami aid inflows could keep the exchange rate steady possibly for the rest of the year, but economic growth may not see an acceleration despite reconstruction efforts, Corera said.

The tsunami has also reinforced expectations that neither the Colombo government nor Tamil Tiger rebels will resume their decades-old war because both sides suffered when giant waves swept much of the island's coastlines.

Hasitha Premaratne of HNB Stockbrokers said although a permanent solution remains a distant prospect, it is believed both sides will maintain a ceasefire in place since February 2002.

Economic growth forecasts have been cut by one percentage point to 5.0 for 2005. The Central Bank says the country needs 6.0-8.0 percent growth to tackle poverty and unemployment. Last year growth was a 5.4 percent.

The tsunamis that killed 31,000 people and left a million people initially displaced in Sri Lanka has now also put a smile on the face of the country's top economic managers.

"The aid figure is not important, what is important is that we have got enough (foreign aid) commitments to undertake our entire reconstruction program," Finance Secretary PB Jayasundera said.

"What this means is the confidence our development partners have in us."

The so-called "tsunami dividend," however, may be fleeting, according to a study backed by the United Nations Development Program.

"Rising poverty and unemployment, worsened by the tsunami and slow development in conflict-affected areas, threaten Sri Lanka's social sector gains," said the report, released at last week's review of aid to the island.

The report notes the tsunami-magnified development challenges - persistent slow growth, rising unemployment and malnutrition in rural areas and the conflict districts in the north and east.

"The tsunami disaster has increased the vulnerability of a large proportion of the very people whose income was to be uplifted under the government's poverty reduction programme," the report said.

The government's poverty reduction strategy includes major infrastructure projects in depressed areas in a bid to generate employment with the help of foreign aid, but the country's ability to absorb overseas help has been dismal.

Official figures show that the island was able to utilise only about 18 percent of its foreign aid last year due to bureaucratic delays and red tape.

Some five million people, or over a quarter of the 19.5 million population, still live below the poverty line, although the country for the first time crossed the 1,000-dollar per capita income mark last year to hit 1,030 dollars.

Source: Sify - Taramani,Chennai,India

Tsunami quake 9.15 on scale

The devastating December 26 earthquake that rocked the Indian Ocean and unleashed a tsunami that killed nearly 300,000 people was even stronger than officials had believed.

It measured 9.15 on the Richter scale, according to studies published in the journal Science.

Scientists from the University of California, Berkeley, the Wadia Institute of Himalayan Geology in India and the United States Geological Survey also found that the earthquake was longer than first thought, lasting at least an hour and perhaps up to three hours.

Source: New Zealand Herald - Auckland,New Zealand

Friday, May 20, 2005

Pondy CM launches tsunami project

Pondicherry Chief Minister N Rangasamy today launched the World Bank-aided tsunami reconstruction project costing Rs 180 crore in the Union Territory.

With the help of the World Bank assistance, about 10,000 houses would be constructed in villages which were damaged by the December 26 tsunami, he told reporters after launching the project

This was the first time that the Union Territory had received such an assistance from the World Bank and the assistance would also be used for rehabilitation of people affected by the tsunami in Pondicherry and Karaikal regions, he said.

Earlier, World Bank Country Director, India, Michael F Carter, released the agreement entered into by the World Bank authorities and the Union Territory's officials in New Delhi on May 12.

Carter told the meeting that this was the first time that the World Bank was assisting a project in the Union Territory. The bank would render assistance in all endeavours of the Pondicherry administration, he said.

Source: Chennai Online - Chennai,India

Earth 'still ringing' from tsunami quake

The Indian Ocean earthquake that triggered the great Boxing Day tsunami literally shook the world and triggered a swarm of minor earthquakes 11,000 kilometres away in Alaska.

It set new records - the longest fault rupture ever seen; the longest duration and the most energetic swarm of aftershocks ever observed.

The calamity began with a sudden shift on average of more than 16.5ft (5 metres) along an 800 mile fault line deep below the ocean. Just off Banda Aceh in northern Sumatra, the ocean floor suddenly moved north-eastward, pushing as much as 20 metres under the Burma tectonic plate.

It raised the tip of the Burma plate several metres, and it lifted the ocean itself, setting up a tsunami that slammed into the coasts of Sumatra, Malaysia, India and Sri Lanka, killing 300,000 people.

The earthquake was so catastrophic that its effects could be measured from space, according to scientists reporting today in the US journal Science. It rearranged the Earth's surface and caused measurable deformation almost 2,800 miles away.

'The Earth is still ringing like a bell today,' said Roland B�rgmann of the University of California, Berkeley. 'We have never been able to study earthquakes of this magnitude before, where a sizable portion of the Earth was distorted. Normally, we see deformation of the surface a few hundred kms away. But here we see deformation 4,500 kms away, and five or six times the deformation we have seen in previous quakes.'

Seismologists now believe that the 9.15 magnitude earthquake was probably twice as powerful as previously estimated. The violence was also was more enduring: much of the movement along the fault line happened half an hour after the initial shock and continued for up to three hours.

Readings from 41 GPS stations were used to reconstruct the biggest shock in 40 years. At one site, 45,000 kms from the epicentre, the surface shifted by just a millimetre. It shifted two cms in southern India.

The shock waves caused the ground to rise and fall 9 cms in Sri Lanka. It moved massive slabs of rock 20 metres, along a 1,300km section of the fault. And it set the Earth ringing.

"Just like thumping a watermelon to hear if it is ripe, after a big earthquake thumps our planet we measure the natural tones from seismograms to detect properties of the Earth's deep mantle and core," said Jeffrey Park of Yale University. "The Sumatran-Andaman earthquake produced the best documentation of the Earth's free oscillations ever recorded."

Previous comparable earthquakes all occurred at least 40 years ago: in Kamchatka in Russia in 1952; the Aleutian islands in 1957; southern Chile in 1960 and Prince William Sound, Alaska, in 1964.

"This really is a watershed event. We've never had such comprehensive data for a great earthquake, because we didn't have the instrumentation to gather it 40 years ago. And then the sheer size of the event is so awesome.

"It is nature at its most formidable, and it has been humbling to all of us who have studied it, " said Thorne Lay of the University of California, Santa Cruz. "Even among seismologists, we call this a monster earthquake."

Source: Guardian Unlimited - UK

Wednesday, May 18, 2005

7 projects for the tsunami victims

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in conjunction with the Ministerial Advisory Committee has selected 7 projects to benefit from the Tsunami Relief Fund after completing a selection process for long term humanitarian and/or development assistance projects in Sri Lanka.

After issuing a call for Expressions of Interest last February, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs received a total of 14 project proposals for evaluation by the Ministerial Advisory Committee.

The total value of these 7 projects selected amounts to Lm424,292. The Tsunami Relief Fund, consisting of funds collected through L-Istrina, is administered by the Ministerial Advisory Committee in such a way to provide maximum benefit for the victims of the Tsunami, in collaboration with the Governments of the affected countries and according to Malta Government Financial Regulations. These projects will continue to be monitored throughout the period of implementation.

It is estimated that thousands of Sri Lankan people will benefit from these projects to be funded by the Maltese people through the money collected during L-Istrina: fishing boats to supply 525 families (over 2000 people), renovation of a school attended by 2000 students and 86 teachers, houses for 65 families (325 people), medical clinic for 2000 people, sports and recreation project for 6500 youths per year, employment of 60 people and income for 300 family members.

Out of the Lm490,000 (approximate figure) collected during l-Istrina, the Ministerial Advisory Committee for the Tsunami Relief Fund has decided to allocate, at this stage, a maximum sum of Lm430,000. The remaining funds will be allocated at a later stage.

Over the next few days, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs will be issuing to the responsible organisations and individuals, letters of commitment for the selected projects. The formal, official presentation will take place before the end of the month.

Source: di-ve.com - Malta

S.Lanka tsunami pact near as aid hits $3 bln

Sri Lanka is on the verge of agreeing a long-elusive tsunami aid pact with Tamil Tiger rebels, a top government official said on Tuesday, as donations and debt relief hit $3 billion -- twice the amount needed.

Jayantha Dhanapala, head of the government's Peace Secretariat, told donors attending a two-day donor conference in the ancient hill capital of Kandy the deal would be sealed after a few more meetings, which officials said could mean within days.

'Now there is some kind of finality reached on establishing the post-tsunami administrative mechanism, a few more consultations need to take place and after that it will be signed,' Dhanapala said.

Earlier this month the Tigers said they doubted the proposed aid mechanism would be implemented even if signed, and warned that a three-year truce after two decades of civil war was in jeopardy because of broken government promises.

However, President Chandrika Kumaratunga vowed on Monday to push for a deal despite strong opposition from her government's Marxist junior coalition ally, which has threatened to quit and topple the government if it strikes a deal with the rebels.

Finance Minister Sarath Amunugama said fresh aid commitments from Japan and China had helped boost the previous tally of $2.2 billion in aid and $300 million in Paris Club debt relief.

'With Japan and China's latest announcements, (pledged aid) has exceeded our expectations,' Amunugama told a news conference.

'We have received assurances that up to $3 billion will be made available for the reconstruction phase,' he added.

The government has estimated it will cost around $1.5 billion to $1.6 billion to rebuild towns, schools and other infrastructure destroyed by December's tsunami.

The increase in aid pledges came despite assurances from the government and the World Bank that there was already enough aid available for reconstruction, and it was not immediately clear what any excess would be used for.

But the pledges will come as welcome news to around 100,000 people still living in tents and makeshift, stifling shelters nearly five months after the tsunami battered Sri Lanka's coastline and swept nearly 40,000 people to their deaths.

Central Bank Gov. Sunil Mendis told Reuters the inflow of aid coupled with a debt freeze from rich creditor nations could help offset the tsunami's original impact on the bank's 2005 growth forecast.

"With the pledged aid coming in, the projected growth rate of 5.3 percent, it can improve to anything between 5.3 and 6.0 percent this year," Mendis told Reuters on the sidelines of the conference.

The Paris Club of rich creditor nations offered in March to freeze Sri Lanka's debt payments totalling $300 million until the end of 2005 -- a freeze the Sri Lankan government would like extended to three years.

"The debt moratorium from the Paris Club will help the economy a great deal. It will ease the repayment pressures. And the inflow of funds will stabilise the exchange rate and our reserves will grow," Mendis said.

Sri Lanka's rupee firmed on Tuesday on expectations that aid pledges will be spent in the economy as cash.

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Tuesday, May 17, 2005

Over 40% of Lanka's tsunami-dead were Muslims: Report

Muslims constitute eight per cent of Sri Lanka's 20 million people, but they account for 40.8 per cent of the dead in the December 26, 2004 tsunami.

Out of the total of 30,718 people killed in the island, 12,562 were Muslims. Amparai district in southeastern Sri Lanka accounted for 7258 (58 per cent) of the total Muslim dead, according to statistics published by the Tamil daily Virakesari on Saturday.

The overall island-wide figure for the missing is 5815. Out of this, 1980 (34 per cent) are Muslims. Of the 14,998 injured, 7285 (48.5 per cent) are Muslims.

The tsunami displaced 230,700 persons island-wide. Out of this, 41,671 (18 per cent) were Muslims.

85,833 houses were fully damaged, out of which Muslim houses accounted for 21,751 (25.3 per cent). Out of the 36,616 houses partially damaged, 12,207 (33.3 per cent) belonged to Muslims.

Though this small and third minority in the island took more than its share of the tsunami tragedy, it is being given a raw deal in post-tsunami reconstruction, Muslim leaders complain.

In the proposed Joint Mechanism between the Government and the LTTE for the North Eastern Province, the Muslims have a minor share. The LTTE, which is the sole representative of the Tamils, enjoys the lion's share of the power. This despite the fact that the LTTE controls only 10 per cent of the tsunami-hit territory in the North East.

According to the World Bank, the Eastern districts (where Muslims live) account for 41.1 per cent of the financial needs. The Southern and Western provinces (where the Sinhalas live) account for 29 per cent and 12.6 per cent respectively. The North, where the Tamils live, accounts for 17.2 per cent.

Source: Hindustan Times - Delhi,India

Sri Lanka plans to coordinate tsunami aid

Sri Lanka's plan to jointly coordinate tsunami aid with Tamil Tiger rebels in Tamil-majority areas could be a golden opportunity to resolve the country's two-decade ethnic conflict, the president told the opening of a donors conference Monday.

President Chandrika Kumaratunga said she would go forward with the plan within weeks despite opposition within her own ruling coalition, in comments aimed as much at domestic politics as the delegates of 125 governments and aid agencies gathered to address post-tsunami reconstruction.

'The government, at least the major part of it, believes that this is a good opportunity' to bridge gaps between the Tigers and the government, Kumaratunga said. 'It will open many doors for a final solution to the ethnic problem of Sri Lanka.'

Residents in Tamil-majority areas controlled by the Tigers have complained that aid has been slow to reach them since the devastating earthquake and tsunami of Dec. 26 killed more than 31,000 people in the country and affected 1 million others.

International donors have been reluctant to give any funds directly to the guerrillas, listed as terrorists by the United States, but most of them are willing to give to a joint body comprised of representatives of both the government and the rebels.

Kumaratunga has backed a joint body, but the Marxist People's Liberation Front, her main ally in the coalition government, has threatened to withdraw if the plan goes ahead, saying it would help the rebels attain their goal of a separate Tamil state.

The front controls 39 seats in the country's 225-member Parliament, and Kumaratunga's government could collapse without its support.
Kumaratunga indicated that the cooperation with the rebels would go forward within weeks, saying it could be "one ray of hope" from the tsunami disaster, helping to resolve a civil war that's killed 65,000 people since 1983.

Meanwhile, the World Bank said there would be no shortage of funds to carry out reconstruction and rehabilitation.

"It now appears to be the case that funding the recovery will not be difficult," the bank's Vice President Praful Patel said.

The Finance Ministry says it has received commitments from foreign donors for $1.5 billion over the next three to four years -- enough to rebuild coasts devastated by the tsunami.

Source: Boston Globe - Boston,MA,USA

Monday, May 16, 2005

Tsunami's toll on women creates bachelor towns

Nestled between steep, forested hills and a white sandy beach, Meunasah Mesjid is one of Aceh's new bachelor villages after the Dec. 26 tsunami, which killed a disproportionate number of women and children.

The biggest tsunami ever recorded, triggered by the strongest earthquake in 45 years, killed nine out of 10 people in this picturesque village on Aceh's northern coast, a mere 150 kms (93 miles) from the quake's epicentre.

Only 161 of Meunasah Mesjid's 1,110 people survived -- just 45 of them females.

The people here now live in tents pitched amidst twisted cars, endless piles of rubble and ruined paddy field, utterly dependent on distributions of food, water and other aid.

'A lot of the men were up in the hills cutting meranti trees for logs. Others were in the paddy fields and some men work in the city,' said the village's recovery coordinator, Mulia, explaining why more men survived.

Some men were also out fishing at sea and many of them survived as the wave passed under their boats.

In some villages, the disaster killed up to four times as many women as men, international aid group Oxfam said after a survey of villages. Its finding were similar in India and Sri Lanka.

'In some villages it now appear that up to 80 percent of those killed were women,' Becky Buell, Oxfam's policy director, said in the report released on March 26.

'We are already hearing about rapes, harrassment and forced early marriages,' she said.

A group of women gathered at lunchtime in the community hall, now being used as the tsunami recovery centre, said that hadn't happened in Meunasah Mesjid. But single, divorced and widowed women acknowledged they were coming under pressure to marry.

'I get a lot of pressure to marry and have children, but I haven't found my soulmate yet," said Omrahwati, 32, who like many others in the village was wearing a hat, shirt, gloves and galoshes that USAID is distributing to villages throughout Aceh as part of a clean-up campaign.

"There's pressure," said Elliyana, 19. "I want to marry an Acehnese. There's a lot of choices now, so that's good."

The tsunami took an appalling toll on children, many of whom were home on a Sunday morning with their mothers.

Mulia said in Meunasah only eight children between the ages of two to nine survived, along with four teenagers.

Many women and young children, struggling to stay afloat or on their feet, simply tired and drowned when the tsunami, travelling at speeds of 45 kms (28 miles) an hour or more, raced across Aceh's coastal plain.

Women clinging to one or several children would tire even more quickly, Oxfam said.

"I'm afraid to get married again," said Zora, 35 and divorced. Three of her five children were lost in the tsunami. "But I do want to have children again."

Men may face problems of their own once their lives regain some semblance of normalcy as they take on unfamiliar household tasks or look after their families.

Some may could become willing recruits for Acehnese separatist rebels hiding up in the hills.

The men in the community hall say their sympathies are with the Free Aceh Movement, known by its Indonesian acronym, GAM. But they are hedging their bets.

"People here are 'wait and see'. If GAM is winning, they'll join the revolution. If the government is winning, they'll follow the government. But our sympathy is with GAM," said one fisherman.

A rebel commander who grew up in Meunasah came out of the hills a day after the disaster to hand out rice and fish -- the first aid distribution in the village, Mulia said.

But the men might also find gainful employment courtesy of the U.S. Agency for International Development, which is building a 247 km road from the capital Banda Aceh on the northern tip of Sumatra to Meulaboh on the west coast. The road will run through Meunasah.

USAID said its primary objective is to make a "significant contribution to improving livelihoods, employment and the local economy."

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Sri Lanka tsunami donors to meet

Tsunami aid donors meet in Sri Lanka on Monday, with survivors hoping pledges of $2bn will be firmed up.

Five months after the disaster, relief is still not getting through to rebel-held parts of the north and east because of a row over distributing aid.

The government promised last month it would agree a joint mechanism with the Tamil Tigers on sharing the aid, but coalition hardliners oppose a deal.

More than 100 donors and lenders will meet to assess progress.

Nearly 31,000 people were killed when the tsunami struck Sri Lanka's coast on 26 December. A million were made homeless.

'We hope to have a frank report from the government on its plans,' US ambassador to Sri Lanka Jeffrey Lunstead told the AFP news agency.

He said the conference in the town of Kandy would also address wider issues of poverty reduction.

Source: BBC News - UK

Friday, May 13, 2005

Petals fall at tsunami service

Thousands of petals fluttered down from the ceiling of London's St Paul's Cathedral in memory of all those who perished in the Asian tsunami.

More than 1,800 people attended the emotional memorial service, including the Queen and PM Tony Blair.

Families of the 148 Britons who died or are still missing gathered in the cathedral to pay their respects.

Source: This is London - London,England,UK

Ex-Presidents Remind Charities of Tsunami

Former Presidents Clinton and Bush, who are leading the U.S. effort to help tsunami victims in Southeast Asia, challenged aid organizations on Thursday to pick up the pace of their relief work.

Clinton urged the groups to spend the money collected as soon as possible, saying victims are frustrated by delays in recovery projects.

"We need to move this thing as quick as we can," Clinton told business leaders, foreign dignitaries and others at a meeting on the relief campaign.

"Now is the time we need help from the private sector and we need this ... money released, I understand why nobody wants this money released until they're confident it can be effectively spent," Clinton said.

Bush agreed: "We're all anxious to see the rebuilding get a greater sense of momentum."

The Dec. 26 tsunami, brought on by the region's strongest earthquake in four decades, claimed more than 180,000 lives across the Indian Ocean basin and left more than 1 million people homeless.

Bush and Clinton visited the region in February.

Clinton, who is also U.N. envoy for tsunami recovery, said the next six months are crucial -- "by far the hardest period, practically and emotionally.

"This is the period that will be make-or-break whether people that live in these countries -- particularly those who were affected -- believe that the world meant what it said when all the heartbreak occurred," Clinton said.

Ken Hackett, president of Catholic Relief Services, said aid groups have to be careful in how they spend money, even if it means taking more time. His group has raised $152 million for tsunami relief and spent $14 million. His group will spend the money over five years to seven years.

Hackett said agencies that have connections in the countries they are helping have been able to act more quickly.

Sri Mulyani Indrawati, Indonesia's development minister, said it is vital to make sure a credible, coordinated system is established among donors, governments and other involved parties.

Source: Los Angeles Times - CA,USA

Thursday, May 12, 2005

Queen, Blair at tsunami memorial

QUEEN Elizabeth and British Prime Minister Tony Blair joined hundreds of people at a memorial service in London today honouring the 124 Britons killed in the Asian tsunami disaster in December.

Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, the head of the Anglican Church, said the memorial in St Paul's Cathedral was a necessary sacred moment to 'say something about what is left when the waters have gone down'.

'We are giving ourselves time to notice what so often escapes us - that the human response to pain and tragedy is as unreasonable as so much of the tragedy itself. It is generous and creative, self-forgetful,...' Archbishop Williams said according to an advanced copy of his sermon.

Film director Lord Richard Attenborough, whose daughter and granddaughter were killed in the December 26 tragedy, was also due to give a reading at the ceremony, attended by families and friends, as well as survivors and aid workers.

In a casualty list updated this week, Britain said 124 of its nationals had died in the disaster, in which a massive earthquake centred off the Indonesian island of Sumatra set off tsunamis which wreaked destruction in 11 Indian Ocean countries.

Another 21 Britons are still missing and feared dead. Overall, some 217,000 people died, most of them in Indonesia.

During the memorial service in London, the assembly was expected to observe a two-minute silence during which some 300,000 flower petals - taken from plants associated with the countries affected by the quake - were to be dropped from the cathedral dome and galleries.

Relatives of the British victims and several other nationals were also expected to take part in a procession through the cathedral.

Source: Daily Telegraph - Sydney,New South Wales,Australia

Red tape leaves tsunami aid stranded at docks

Five months after the Asian tsunami disaster many hundreds of containers of aid are stranded at ports in Indonesia and Sri Lanka because of bureaucratic bungling and missing paperwork.

As many as 500 containers, equivalent to a quarter of all aid shipped to Sri Lanka after the Boxing Day tragedy, are on the dockside in Colombo. In Indonesia 1,500 containers are stacked at the Sumatran port of Medan, according to customs records, with 599 of the units unclaimed or needing import permits.

The tsunami, triggered by an earthquake off Indonesia, left 300,000 dead in countries around the Indian Ocean. With a lot of the aid, including containers sent by international companies, stranded on docksides, coordination of the relief work is again being questioned.

Gert Venghaus, tsunami operations coordinator for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, said the problems underscored the repeated plea of aid agencies for private donors to send cash rather than unsolicited goods.

Difficulties faced by aid agencies have also increased concern among donors about the internationally funded reconstruction efforts being launched by Indonesia and other countries.

In Sri Lanka officials say most of the containers are stranded in Colombo because of missing paperwork and bureaucracy. Local distribution agencies have also been overwhelmed by the flow of aid.

Aid groups say unclear rules on duties, lack of available warehousing, and a requirement that every container be unloaded and inspected by navy officers have led to the dockside pile-up.

At Medan containers have been languishing since January, even though survivors in nearby Aceh are calling for more assistance. A 40ft container of �Lemon Squidgit� and other soap sent in January by Soapworks, a Scottish subsidiary of The Body Shop group, has been stuck at the port because of incomplete paperwork, say customs officials.

Eight 20ft containers of drinking water sent by Diageo's Australasian division at the end of January remain in Medan because the Indonesian Red Cross lost paperwork when it moved offices.

Diageo in Sydney said: “We sent it directly to the Red Cross in order to get around the red tape. So it's a bit of a surprise and somewhat of a disappointment that we learn now that it is still sitting on the dock.”

Merlin, a UK-based medical aid group, said it had faced “bureaucratic delays involving several ministries” in its efforts to import three four-wheel-drive vehicles that arrived at Medan on February 7 and remain stuck there.

Indonesian customs officials say dozens of vehicles destined for Aceh province are still awaiting import permits. Fourteen ambulances recently sent to Indonesia by Unicef, the United Nations children's agency, took two months to clear customs.

Source: Financial Times - UK

Wednesday, May 11, 2005

Shocking' lack of Aceh tsunami repairs

The Indonesian official in charge of rebuilding tsunami-hit Aceh province says he is shocked at how little has been done for the survivors, and claims virtually no money has been received for reconstruction.

Kuntoro Mangkusubroto said there was no sense of urgency in disbursing the 6trillion rupiah ($792million) earmarked in the Jakarta Government's budget for rebuilding areas hit by the tsunami.

In the job for just over a week, the former minister for mining and energy said the reconstruction funds had to come through the bureaucracy and get approval from parliament, and he did not expect the money to be available until September.

Meanwhile, Dr Kuntoro said, his agency would rely on $US2 billion ($2.59 billion) pledged by major non-government agencies and the private sector to kickstart the reconstruction in Aceh.

Even here, much had to be done before the development funds could begin to be fully used, he said.

'It's shocking - very limited things have been done for the poor people,' Dr Kuntoro said in Jakarta after visiting Aceh to get a first-hand look at the monumental task he faces.

'There are no roads being built, no bridges being built, no harbours being built. When it comes to reconstruction - zero.'

The December 26 disaster left 160,000 people dead or missing in Aceh province, made about 500,000 homeless and destroyed the economy.

The Aceh Rehabilitation and Reconstruction agency headed by Dr Kuntoro is due to manage nearly $US5billion in reconstruction aid. The appointment of the Stanford University-trained engineer, who reports directly to President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, has been applauded by the international community.

One problem with the slow pace of reconstruction, he said, was the time it took to get the agency set up, with donors unsure about who needed to approve projects. The agency was incorporated in an Aceh reconstruction blueprint that was finished only last month.

* Japan is sending its peace envoy on his 10th visit to Sri Lanka this week in an attempt to broker agreement between the Colombo Government and Tamil Tiger rebels on the distribution of aid there.

After Indonesia, Sri Lanka was the country hardest-hit by the tsunami, with 30,000 people killed.

A joint rebuilding operation by government and rebel forces may break a deadlock in peace talks aimed at ending the two-decade civil war, and release millions of dollars to rebuild houses, roads, ports and hospitals. Japan is Sri Lanka's biggest aid donor.

Source: Australian - Australia

Tsunami trust fund pays for 20,000 homes

Indonesia and foreign donors have agreed to spend $US250 million ($A323.7 million) to build 20,000 homes in areas hit by the December tsunami and a later earthquake, repair roads and bridges, and set up a system to recover lost land records.

The decision is a signal that the long-delayed reconstruction process is speeding up.

The money will come from a $US500 million ($A647.3 million) trust fund, which was set up to ensure aid for the tsunami-ravaged Indonesian province of Aceh and the quake-hit island of Nias is not lost to corruption.

It is being managed by the Indonesian government, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, European Commission and about 20 donor countries.

The bulk of the grants, the first approved by the trust fund committee, will go to housing, with $US150 million be used to build 20,000 homes and repair 30,000 damaged ones, the World Bank said.

Another $US72 million will be used to repair roads, bridges, schools and water supplies in thousands of villages and provide capital to 6,000 small businesses.

The remaining $US28 million will go to "sort out land ownership" by recovering damaged land records, establishing a land occupancy data base and rehabilitating the land administration system in Aceh, the bank said.

Indonesia was the hardest hit of the dozen countries struck by the December 26 tsunami.

More than 128,000 people died in Aceh province and hundreds of thousands were left homeless.

Three months later, an earthquake devastated Nias island, leaving more than 900 dead and thousands homeless.

Source: Sydney Morning Herald (subscription) - New South Wales,Australia

Tuesday, May 10, 2005

Water expert off to tsunami-ravaged Indonesia

The City of Toronto is sending one of its water and sanitation experts to Aceh province, Indonesia, to assist with critical mid- to long-term relief following the tsunami of Dec. 26. Ted Bowering will travel under the direction of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) from May 9 - 27.

Working directly with CIDA and in co-operation with the UN Development Programme (UNDP) which is undertaking a major Aceh Emergency Response and Transitional Recovery (ERTR) program, Bowering will:

support the organization of local tsunami recovery projects in Aceh in the area of municipal waste management, and
support the ERTR project team in reviewing and co-ordinating activities in the area of water and sanitation among UNDP, UNICEF and WHO programs, identifying cross-cutting aspects and potential for greater synergies for water/sanitation, and for upgrading the sludge treatment plant and landfill in Banda Aceh.

Bowering has been employed with the City of Toronto for more than 20 years. He is currently a manager of policy and program development in Toronto Water. The City, in its agreement with CIDA, will pay Bowering's salary and benefits while abroad. CIDA will cover travel, accommodation and other expenses.

'I'm very pleased that the City has afforded me this opportunity to assist the people of Indonesia. Clean water and sanitation is critical to rebuilding efforts. I look forward to sharing my expertise and helping Banda Aceh in its continuing recovery,' said Bowering.

'I'm very pleased the City of Toronto is able to offer the expertise required,' said Mayor David Miller. 'This is exactly the sort of help that municipalities are well-placed to offer, and I hope Toronto can do more in the region. We wish Ted a safe and productive journey."

"Mr. Bowering will be playing an important role in relief efforts," said International Cooperation Minister Aileen Carroll. "This is a great example of the Government of Canada working in partnership with the City of Toronto to improve the lives of vulnerable people around the world. We will continue to call upon the expertise available through the City of Toronto and the Federation of Canadian Municipalities to support reconstruction initiatives in the tsunami-affected countries."

Following the tsunami disaster last Boxing Day, the City of Toronto committed to offering mid- to long-term assistance in the region with expertise where needed most. This is the first step in fulfilling that commitment. The City continues to work with Federation of Canadian Municipalities and CIDA, as well as its employees, to offer that expertise as the region begins rebuilding efforts. Four hundred and thirty-nine City employees have indicated a willingness to travel to the area and assist with rebuilding.

The Canadian government has committed $425 million over five years toward a comprehensive response to tsunami. These funds will be used for relief and rehabilitation, as well as reconstruction in the most affected countries.

Source: National Post - Don Mills,Ontario,Canada

Bosnia-based group to help identify Tsunami victims

A Sarajevo-based organisation which helped identify victims of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the United States said on Monday it would help identify victims of the Asian tsunami.

The International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP) said in a statement it was asked by Thailand, Britain and Germany to help identify some of the tsunami victims using DNA analysis.

More than 200,000 people were killed or went missing after giant waves caused by an undersea earthquake swept across the Indian Ocean on Dec. 26.

The commission has developed techniques to identify victims from Bosnia's 1992-95 war, which killed up to 200,000 people. Its technology also helped identify people who died in the Sept. 11 strikes on U.S. cities.

The ICPM has identified more than 5,000 people who went missing during the wars that tore apart old Yugoslavia in the 1990s. About 25,000 people remain unaccounted for.

It says it is the only organisation which uses DNA analysis to match bone samples from remains found in mass graves and other sites with relatives' blood samples.

The agency said it would analyse in its laboratories in Sarajevo and Tuzla 750 bone samples that the representatives of the three countries brought to Sarajevo last week because prior testing by private DNA laboratories had failed.

'Our experts are able to extract DNA profiles from bone samples even if they are highly deteriorated,' said ICMP official Andreas Kleiser.

The agency began this year to work with Iraqi authorities to help find out the fate of about 300,000 people suspected to have disappeared under Saddam Hussein's rule.

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Monday, May 09, 2005

Aceh tsunami chief in mission against corruption

Emergency rule imposed on Indonesia's Aceh last year to deal with a simmering rebellion will be lifted this month, the head of the tsunami-hit province's reconstruction agency said on Sunday.

Kuntoro Mangkusubroto also told Reuters in his first interview with a foreign reporter since taking up his post this month that he was on a 'sacred mission' to quash any sign of corruption in one of the biggest aid programmes in history.

Civil emergency rule is due to expire on May 18. If it is not extended, the move would signal Indonesia's willingness to intensify efforts to strike a peace deal with rebels of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) when a fourth round of peace talks is held in Helsinki from May 26-31.

'It will not be extended,' Kuntoro, chairman of the powerful agency, told Reuters in the first disclosure of the government's intention to lift the emergency status.

Kuntoro, a Stanford University-trained engineer and respected former energy minister, made no further comments on the law. It was introduced a year ago and extended for six months last November and followed one year of martial law.

The rebellion has partly abated since the biggest tsunami on record slammed into Aceh on Dec. 26, following a 9.0 magnitude earthquake -- the strongest in 45 years -- leaving 160,000 dead and a half-million homeless. Jakarta wants the rebels to lay down their arms and participate in the oil and gas-rich province's reconstruction.

Kuntoro's Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Body for Aceh Province and Nias Island in North Sumatra will manage nearly $5 billion.
Much of that will come from foreign donors who worry how the money will be spent in a country that Transparency International rates as one of the five most corrupt in the world.

He is taking a novel approach to the problem: requiring anybody handling aid money to sign a legally enforceable "integrity pact" to come into force this month.

"It starts out with 'In the name of God' ... It's both a moral and a legal document,'" he said, adding that those caught misusing aid would be subject to double the penalties under Indonesian law, including prison terms.

"NO SENSE OF URGENCY"

But his most immediate concern is getting money out of his own government. The national parliament has yet to appropriate a budget to compensate victims and rebuild shattered villages.

He himself is staying in a house provided by the United Nations, drives a car given to him by the Banda Aceh mayor and flew here on tickets donated by the Asian Development Bank.

"Those bureaucrats have no sense of urgency," he fumed.

Indonesia faces the most daunting rebuilding task of all the Indian Ocean nations affected by the tsunami that is feared to have killed almost 230,000 people in all.

A blueprint for reconstruction earmarks compensation to victims: 28 million rupiah ($3,000) for destruction of a house, 10 million for a damaged one and 15 million for losses by a group.

Many of the homeless are on work programmes, financed by charity groups, that pay them about $3.75 a day to clean up ruins that have been described as akin to a nuclear holocaust.

The government estimates it will have to build 100,000 homes, and with 800 km (500 miles) of coastline destroyed, regenerating the fisheries and agriculture industries is important. But revitalising businesses to create jobs is the most urgent priority, Kuntoro said.

"The approach will be bottom up. People will decide what to do, how they will lay out their villages, where to put clinics, the mosques, the schools," Kuntoro said.

"This is a sacred mission for me. On one side there all these donations, from small children giving their lunch money to old pensioners. And on the other are the 160,000 people who died and 450,000 homeless in Aceh. There must not be one cent lost in the process."

He aims to make Aceh's renewal a model of development for Indonesia. "If we can solve Aceh, we can solve any Indonesian problem."

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Indonesia Won't Squander Tsunami Funds

Indonesian officials have assured the United States that they will not allow billions of dollars pledged for tsunami relief to be squandered through corruption, a senior U.S. diplomat said Sunday.

U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick spoke during a visit to Aceh province, the area hardest hit by the Dec. 26 tragedy. His trip was aimed at publicizing the U.S. role in rebuilding the region, an undertaking Washington hopes will boost its battered image in the world's most populous Muslim nation.

U.S. Deputy Secretary Robert Zoellick, right, listens to Baharuddin, left, a community leader, during his visit at the tsunami-ravaged village of Lamteungoh, Aceh province, Indonesia, Sunday, May 8, 2005. The senior U.S. official visited tsunami-wracked Aceh province on Sunday to publicize America's role in rebuilding the region, an undertaking Washington hopes will boost the country's battered image elsewhere in Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara) (Dita Alangkara - AP)

The world's eyes will be on Indonesia,' Zoellick told The Associated Press in an interview after touring devastated parts of the provincial capital, Banda Aceh. In one struggling coastal community, he was hugged by a tearful survivor.

Corruption is rife in Indonesia, and there have been concerns that much of the aid money could be siphoned off. Aceh, which is also beset by a separatist conflict that has simmered for nearly three decades, is regarded as one of the country's most graft-ridden regions.

Zoellick said he had gotten assurances from local officials that they would be extremely careful with the money. "It's important to have auditing and balances," he said.

The earthquake-triggered waves on Dec. 26 killed at least 126,000 people in Aceh province and other parts of Indonesia's Sumatra island and left almost half a million people homeless. The U.S. military arrived on the scene within days, flying dozens of helicopter missions to distribute lifesaving medicines and food.

The United States has since pledged nearly $1 billion in public and private funds for relief efforts for tsunami-hit countries. Most of the funds are earmarked for Aceh.

Zoellick witnessed the signing of an agreement between U.S. aid officials and the local administration committing Washington to spend $245 million to rebuild a 149-mile coastal highway washed away by the tsunami.

Still many Acehnese have expressed anger at the slow pace of the reconstruction effort. The province is awash with foreign aid groups living in luxury houses, but hundreds of thousands of survivors remain in squalid camps or temporary accommodations.

"There is a tremendous amount to do. This place got hammered," Zoellick said. "The question is how to do the coordination properly. People want to make sure some of the money starts to flow to the projects."

The massive U.S. aid effort comes as anti-American sentiment in Indonesia remains high after the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, which were perceived by many here as attacks on Islam. The U.S. help has been welcomed in Aceh, where distrust of the Jakarta government is high.

Zoellick is on 10-day tour of Southeast Asia. After leaving Aceh, he headed to neighboring Singapore.

Source: Washington Post - Washington,DC,USA

Friday, May 06, 2005

Prompt tsunami relief efforts keep disease outbreak at bay, WHO

Prompt actions and full attention to health aspect in relief process have prevented outbreak of disease in the aftermath of last year's tsunami, a senior official of World Health Organization (WHO) said here on Thursday.

'We were successful in preventing major epidemic and outbreak of disease in these populations (affected by tsunami),' David Nabarro, representative of director general for Health Action in Crisis of WHO, told Xinhua in an interview.

Following many disasters, particular in poor countries, WHO have seen outbreaks of disease for lack of drinking water, damaged sanitary facilities, shortage of food and lack of shelters.

The danger of disease also appeared after last year's tsunami, which left more than 169,000 dead, 127,000 missing and two million people displaced across the Indian Ocean region.

Some small outbreaks of dysentery, other kinds of diarrhoea, measle and malaria were reported found in the affected areas after the tsunami, said Nabarro.

Fortunately, 'those outbreaks didn't develop into epidemics, because of the relief efforts concentrating on health,' he said.

Within one week after the tsunami hit, WHO had set up early warning system in every affected places, which surveyed and reported individual cases and outlined technical guidelines to be observed.

All other relief agencies and governments also quickly concentrated on providing clean water for people to drink, providing sanitation facilities, hygienic knowledge and shelters to affected people.

However, Nabarro warned of complacence over the achievement in disease prevention, calling for continued attentions and efforts to recover the affected countries.

Even there is no concerns of disease outbreak, more work still have to be done to guarantee the health of affected population.

"If you can't make people get back to their normal lives, then they'll get mentally ill and have trauma," said Nabarro.

"It's a little bit urgent to get the homes rebuilt, to get the life back to normal," he said. "The recover face needs more attention. You have plan to rebuild village, to recover health facilities."

More than 500 leading specialists in emergency public health and disaster management are now participating in a WHO-organized meeting in Thailand's resort island of Phuket.

The conference held from Wednesday to Friday is expected to analyze the health response to the tsunami.

Source: Xinhua - Beijing,China

ADRA Launches Tsunami Recovery in Somalia

The Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) is launching a recovery project in Somalia to aid survivors of last December's tsunami. ADRA is supplying livelihood support items, improving access to safe water and sanitation facilities, and training and conducting seminars on hygiene and health topics.

The project will provide livelihood support items including boats, fishing equipment, tents, and household items. The water and sanitation infrastructure component includes construction of solar-powered spring systems, shallow wells, water storage tanks, a borehole, and latrines.
Through establishing and training village-based health committees, ADRA will empower target communities to manage the water and sanitation resources provided by the project. To raise awareness on health issues, ADRA Somalia will train village health promoters and conduct community-training sessions on sanitation, hygiene, and health topics. ADRA Somalia's project will benefit 32,000 survivors of the tsunami and other disasters in the region of Nugal, in northern Somalia. The 18-month project will implement activities in four internally displaced persons (IDP) camps and 18 coastal villages. The project is funded primarily by Aktion Deutschland Hilft (ADH), through ADRA Germany, with a contribution of more than $2.1 million. The Swiss Solidarity Chain is providing funding of nearly $500,000, through ADRA Switzerland, to restore livelihoods in five villages. ADRA Belgium/Luxembourg and ADRA Italy are also assisting ADRA Switzerland in co-financing the Swiss Solidarity Chain project.

The Indian Ocean tsunami on December 26, 2004 affected approximately 404 miles of the Northeast Somali coastline, according to an inter-agency assessment report commissioned by the Somalia Aid Coordination Body (SACB). The report stated that 44,000 people were affected by the tsunami, and that much more of the population had suffered from other recent disasters, such as drought, floods, and freezing temperatures. These disasters have increased the number of IDPs in the area. The SACB and local authorities have urged agencies responding to the tsunami to assist those who have suffered from other disasters as well.

ADRA has been working in Somalia for more than 12 years, and in the Nugal Region since 1996. In addition to the tsunami recovery project, ADRA Somalia is implementing an education project in the Nugal Region funded by the European Commission through ADRA Germany.

ADRA is present in more than 120 countries providing individual and community development and disaster relief without regard to political or religious association, age, or ethnicity.

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Thursday, May 05, 2005

Unearthing Proof of a Tsunami in the Northwest

The threat posed to coastal areas by massive tsunami flooding gained new attention after the Indian Ocean catastrophe that killed 200,000 in December. Now scientists say that a similar tsunami hit the Pacific Northwest in 1700 -- and it may happen again.

As the Pacific Country Emergency Management Agency prepares residents along the Washington and Oregon coasts for that possibility, scientists are learning more about the region's tumultuous past. Situated along the Cascadia Subduction Zone, it has seen years of large earthquakes and flooding.

Geologist Brian Atwater of the U.S. Geological Survey has made many discoveries on the area's Niawiakum River, exposing the history of the land and the peoples who lived there. A layer of beach sand -- and data from Japan, where records extend centuries beyond U.S. accounts -- helped him pinpoint the date of a tsunami that he believes rivaled the Indian Ocean flood: Jan. 26, 1700. Experts say another tsunami may strike in the next 100 years.

Source: NPR (audio) - Washington,D.C.,USA

Strong earthquake rocks parts of tsunami-ravaged Aceh

A strong undersea earthquake rocked parts of Indonesia's tsunami-ravaged Aceh province Wednesday, prompting people to flee their homes, but there were no reports the temblor generated any giant waves, the Indonesian Meteorology and Geophysics Agency said.

The magnitude-5.6 quake occurred at 12:58 p.m. and was centered about 98 miles southwest of Meulaboh on the island of Sumatra, an agency official said.

The epicenter was in the Indian Ocean about 21 miles below the Earth's surface, said Yusuf, an agency official who uses a single name.

Witnesses said the quake jolted the provincial capital of Banda Aceh for about 30 seconds and residents briefly fled into the streets. Witnesses and Yusuf said there were no reports of damage or casualties and no signs the quake spawned a tsunami.

Indonesia, the world's largest archipelago, is prone to seismic upheaval due to its location on the so-called Pacific 'Ring of Fire.'
A massive Dec. 26 quake sparked a deadly tsunami, killing as many as 180,000 people in Indonesia and 10 others countries across the Indian Ocean.

Source: San Diego Union Tribune - San Diego,CA,USA

Wednesday, May 04, 2005

SEYCHELLES: Tsunami recovery programme needs funds, UN Res Coordinator

Efforts to repair infrastructure damaged by the devastating tsunami of December 2004 continue in the Seychelles despite a shortfall in donor funding.

UN Resident Coordinator for Seychelles Aase Smedler told IRIN on Tuesday that the shortfall in funding 'is delaying our response in many areas'.

'It is a setback but we are working ... on a lot of preparatory activities regarding rehabilitation of the fisheries sector, for example,' Smedler noted.

The Indian Ocean island nation was one of the countries affected by the Boxing Day tsunami, when tidal waves killed two people, displaced about 900 families, and damaged public infrastructure and facilities, such as bridges on the main highway between the airport and the capital, Victoria.

Tourism and fisheries, both vital to the economy, were also badly affected. The Seychelles assessed damage from the tsunami at about US $30 million.

In its latest situation report the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) noted that, 'The limited amount of resources pledged by donors against the Flash Appeal continues to hamper rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts. The UN Resident Coordinator is approaching a number of donors to bridge the funding gap. Most of the assistance to date has been provided by the private sector, bilateral contributions, or the government.'

Insufficient funding was hampering full-scale implementation of projects budgeted for in the Flash Appeal. 'Nevertheless, preparatory work for the UN projects in response to the damage caused by the tsunami is in progress,' OCHA noted.

Smedler said the aim of these projects 'is to re-establish economic activity and build up livelihoods'.
According to the OCHA financial tracking website, the Seychelles has received about $4.4 million from donors. Smedler noted that this was against the $11.5 million budgeted for under the Flash Appeal.

"There are possibilities that we're reviewing with donors and we hope that some of them will materialise as sizeable contributions," she added.

Despite the funding shortfall, efforts to clean up and repair environmental and structural damage caused by the tsunami continue. The Ministry of Local Government, Sports and Culture has been using its "emergency brigades" to organise these operations.

A new permanent secretary was recently appointed to chair the committee managing the national emergency fund, in a bid to improve the coordination of information related to tsunami-response activities.

The UN plans to increase support to the Seychelles risk and disaster management secretariat, "particularly with regards to the consolidation and provision of information on tsunami-related response activities," OCHA noted.

Longer-term support to the secretariat will come from the UN Development Programme's project for improving early warning and disaster management systems.

"This project will support national tsunami early warning activities, as part of the government of Seychelles' participation with the [United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation/Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission] UNESCO/IOC-led initiative to establish a regional tsunami early warning system in the Indian Ocean," OCHA noted.

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

FEATURE-Tsunami brings better treatment for Thai stray dogs

"Black, fat, female,' a veterinary worker shouts to an assistant taking notes as she gives a rabies shot to another nameless dog left homeless by the Dec. 26 tsunami on the Thai resort island of Phuket.

Hundreds of such pets were saved by officials and animal rights activists while rescue workers were scouring the Andaman Sea coast for the victims of the Asian tsunami that left 230,000 people dead or missing along the Indian Ocean rim.

But while human survivors in Thailand complain that red tape makes it hard for them to resume normal life, the deadly waves brought better care to the dogs and cats that escaped.

'The tsunami crisis is an opportunity for abandoned animals to be taken care of,' said Roger Lohanan, head of Thai Animal Guardians Association helping stray pets get treatment and new homes.

A U.S. C-130 military cargo plane even flew 120 cats and dogs to Bangkok to find new homes. They had been rescued from Phi Phi Island, where the backpacker movie 'The Beach' was filmed.

Another 64 starving 'tsunami dogs' were rounded up around a makeshift morgue at a Buddhist temple in nearby province of Phang Nga, where some had been nibbling corpses, officials said.

Some have already found new owners and only 30 of them are still at a state shelter.

In Phuket, the city's animal shelter, called 'Mid-Road Dog's House', Thai slang for strays, has more than 400 abandoned dogs.

RUSH OF MONEY
The tsunami devastation brought the Guardians Association a rush of contributions from animal lovers.

The London-based World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA) promised 2 million baht ($50,000), Lohanan said.

But stray dogs are a problem all over Thailand and Lohanan said donations his organisation received would be spent on abandoned animals in other parts of the country if the projects were approved by the donor.

"Many Thais buy dogs as a fad," he said.

"When the film about Dalmatians was showing, it was a Dalmatian fever and a few months later many of them were left on streets," said Lohanan as he pointed to a Dalmatian-street dog cross at the Mid-Road Dog's House.

"Many of these dogs have been left wandering on the street because their owners' houses are too small for them. And when they play and mate with strays, the owners abandon their puppies."

Bangkok is estimated to have at least 120,000 strays.

In areas of Phuket where they pack together, animal activists say, aggressive stray dogs have attacked people, bringing fears of rabies, especially during the very hot March-May period.

"Before the shelter existed in Phuket, strays were taken from the streets and either poisoned or slaughtered,' said Phuket chief veterinarian Sunart Wongchavalit, who started the 1.6 acre (0.6 hectare) dog shelter last year.

But whenever city officials poison or slaughter some of the island's 2,000 to 3,000 strays, controversy erupts as killing is a sin to Thailand's Buddhist majority.

So Phuket authorities plan a law obliging owners to register and insert identification microchips in their dogs, Sunart said. Owners would be fined if their pets were found abandoned.

"After the law is enforced, we hope to eradicate all strays in Phuket in two to three years." (US$1=39.60 Baht)

Source: Reuters AlertNet - London,England,UK

Tuesday, May 03, 2005

War games focus on tsunami

Some 5 800 troops from Japan, Singapore, Thailand and the United States opened one of Asia's largest annual military exercises Monday, focussing on relief operations for natural disasters like the December tsunami.

The Cobra Gold war games run through May 13 and this year focus on responses to natural disasters, after the December 26 tsunami that killed more than 217 000 people in 12 countries around the Indian Ocean.

During the exercises, the combined forces are to run evacuation and relief drills throughout Thailand, but mostly around the northern city of Chiang Mai.

The exercises bring together 3 050 US troops, 2 655 Thais, 76 Singaporeans, and 20 Japanese, as well as observers and humanitarian officials from 16 other countries, the United Nations, and humanitarian groups, a joint statement said.

The Japan Self Defence Forces are participating for the first time since 2001, when Tokyo sent an observation team, amid concern in neighbouring countries about Japan's past militarism.

After the tsunami, the United States deployed 16 000 military personnel, 26 ships, 58 helicopters and 43 fixed wing aircraft in the relief and recovery effort.

This year's Cobra Gold games with about 5 800 troops are notably smaller than those of 2004, when nearly 20 000 personnel were involved.
US officials have said the smaller size was because of other US troop deployments around the world.

Source: News24 - Cape Town,South Africa

NCERT WORKING OUT PLANS TO HELP TSUNAMI HIT STUDENTS IN NEW ACADEMIC SESSION

NCERT has informed that it has organized a series of meetings of various senior officials to discuss the requirements of the Tsunami affected areas.
Three teams have visited different Tsunami hit areas viz. Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Pondicherry and Tamil Nadu between February 8-16, 2005 to assess the educational requirements of these areas which could be addressed by NCERT without duplicating efforts already put in by State Governments, Union Territories, International Agencies and NGOs. As a follow up NCERT has provided NCERT textbooks to children ofA&N Islands free of cost. As on date, 61,152 copies of 120 titles for different classes estimated at Rs. 18,35,478/- have been provided. In addition, examination related inputs for children appearing for Board Examination have been taken up. NCERT has also initiated consultations with various State level organizations and NGOs.

This information was given by Shri M.A.A. Fatmi, Minister of State for Human Resource Development in a written reply in Rajya Sabha today.

Source: Press Information Bureau (press release) - India

Monday, May 02, 2005

‘All well’ in Thai tsunami-hit areas

THE parts of Thailand which had been devastated by the tsunami last year have been fully reconstructed, a top official said yesterday.

Satit Nillwongse, executive director at the International Markets Promotion Department of the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT), told Gulf Times that "everything is back to normal" in those areas.

Three provinces were "more affected than the other parts of the country" in the tsunami. They were Phuket, the country's most popular destination, Krabi and Trang. Though the devastation was widespread, the effect remained only for a month, the official said.

No flights had been cancelled because of the calamity, said Nillwongse, who was in Doha leading a TAT roadshow to the region.

The team included Suppakit Balachandra, TAT director for UK, Ireland, South Africa and the Middle East, Shaikh Rahmatullah, its Middle East representative based in Dubai, and 10 officials of hotels, tour operators and a tourist association.

Murtuza Ali, manager of Darwish Travel Bureau, GSA for Thai Airways, and local travel agents and tour operators attended the workshop, held at Marriott. The activities included products presentation and table top sales sessions.

A new tourism promotion campaign, 'Thailand: Happiness on Earth' was launched during the function.

In 2004, the number of visitors to Thailand totalled 11.65mn, up 16.46% from 2003. Total earnings were $10.3bn, up 24.16% over the previous year.
From the Middle East alone, Thailand received 289,571 tourist arrivals, an increase of 42.03%. The country has set a target of 13.38mn visitors by the end of 2005.

By the end of 2008, Thailand expects to have 20mn visitors, Nillwongs said.

Source: Gulf Times - Doha,Qatar

Housing project for tsunami victims in Galle

A housing project will come up at Walahanduwa, Akmeemana, Galle, for the benefit of tsunami-affected families.

The project, to be carried out by the Urban Development and Water Supply Ministry, will be funded by donations collected by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Sri Lanka Missions abroad after the tsunami disaster.

Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar laid the foundation stone for this project. Addressing the ceremony, he said his Ministry would divert collected funds to construct over 1000 houses in separate complexes of at least 200 houses each.

He said it was a very special occasion for his Ministry as it was possible to do something that would have direct impact on people�s lives.

He pointed that ordinary people abroad had made contributions to raise funds and help Sri Lanka. The responsibility lies with all to ensure that funds are spent without any discrimination, Mr. Kadirgamar added.

He also said a special unit, set up in his Ministry for the collection of funds, would coordinate the progress of the project with the Urban

Development and Water Supply Ministry. "It will be a happy moment when the displaced and affected families actually take possession of these houses," the Minister said.

Ministers, Ministry officials and families affected by the tsunami were present at the ceremony.

According to Foreign Ministry sources, over Rs. 600 million was collected through Sri Lanka Missions following the tsunami disaster. This money will be entirely utilised for providing permanent housing for tsunami-affected families.

The Walahanduwa project is part of this wider plan to provide housing to people affected by the disaster in the Northern, Eastern and Southern parts of the country.

Source: Colombo Page - Colombo,Sri Lanka