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Asian quake disaster toll 1,18,000
India in US-led coalition for Tsunami relief
Bad water, not corpses, main concern
UN launches $ 130 m disaster appeal
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Queen gives ‘substantial’ donation
Aziz, Fazl fail to end rift on key issues
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Asian quake disaster toll 1,18,000
Jakarta, December 30 Indonesia has borne the brunt of Sunday's catastrophe, with a Health Ministry official putting the country's toll at 79,940 with entire coastal villages disappearing under the wall of water. In Sri Lanka 24,743 were confirmed killed by the tidal waves, while 4,916 persons were still missing, the President's office said. The death toll in India hit 10,850, with many thousands still missing, officials said. In southern Thailand nearly 2,400 persons, among them over 700 foreign tourists, were killed, the Interior Ministry said. The ministry listed 6,130 persons missing, most of whom Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said were feared dead. In Myanmar at least 90 persons were killed, according to the UN, but the real toll was expected to be higher. At least 75 persons were killed and another 42 were confirmed missing in the tourist paradise of the Maldives, President Maumoon Abdul Gayoom said. Sixty-six persons were dead in Malaysia, most of them in Penang, the police said. In Bangladesh a father and child were killed after a tourist boat capsized in large waves, officials said. Fatalities also occurred on the east coast of Africa where 132 persons were declared dead in Somalia, 10 in Tanzania and one in Kenya. The US Geological Survey said the earthquake, west of the Indonesian island of Sumatra, measured 9.0 on the Richter scale-making it the largest quake worldwide in four decades. — AFP
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India in US-led coalition for Tsunami relief
President
George W. Bush announced on Wednesday that the USA, India, Australia and Japan would form a coalition to organise humanitarian relief for Asian nations ravaged by Sunday’s tsunami, and senior United Nations officials stressed the need to set a 12-month deadline to install an early warning system to prevent a repeat disaster.
Mr Bush said Secretary of State Colin L. Powell had spoken to his counterparts in all three countries about building an international coalition and added he was confident “more nations will join this core group in short order.” The President designated Undersecretary of State Marc Grossman to lead a US task force to work with these partners, “to help coordinate interagency response in our own government and to encourage other nations to participate in the relief efforts.” Mr Grossman said it was Mr Powell who proposed setting up the core group “and the President agreed - that this core group of the three countries plus us were in a position geographically with capabilities to do something quickly to coordinate efforts that are on the ground.” Looking to forestall future tragedies,
Sálvano Briceño, director of the International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, a U.N. initiative for increasing knowledge sharing in areas of risk management, called for immediate work to install a tsunami early warning system in the Indian Ocean such as already exists in the Pacific Ocean. Such a system would allow quick evacuation of threatened areas before a tsunami struck. “I want to see that every coastal country around South Asia and Southeast Asia has at least a basic but effective tsunami warning system in place by this time next year,” he said. “There is no reason why this cannot be done. We have been in contact with U.N. agencies, technical institutions and governments in the region affected, and find that there is a strong basis of knowledge, technology and collaboration and a real readiness to act.” Jan Egeland, undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief for the UN, said the issue would be discussed at next month’s World Conference on Disaster Reduction in Kobe, Japan. Requests for international and US assistance have been made by the governments of Indonesia, Malaysia, Maldives, Somalia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. Andrew Natsios, administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, said India has “a very established disaster management system and we have actually a bilateral relationship for disaster training and technical assistance with the Indian government through AID for some years now.” Meanwhile, Mr Bush defended US aid for the victims of the disaster. “We’re a very generous, kindhearted nation,” he said, adding that the initial U.S.A. pledge of $35 million in direct financial aid is “only the beginning of our help.” So far, the US contribution is 13 percent of the $270 million in international aid that has been pledged, the United Nations said on Wednesday. Compared to the $35 million pledged by the USA, Spain has pledged $68 million, Japan $30 million, Britain $29 million, Australia $27.6 million, Germany $27 million, France $20.5 million and Denmark $15.5 million, the United Nations reported. The Washington Post reported the current US aid to Asia is drastically lower than in other recent natural disasters. After Hurricane Mitch in 1998, when about 9,000 people were killed and three million were left homeless in Central America, the USA provided $988 million in relief assistance. Health experts worry stagnant water and sewage can also provide a breeding spot for the mosquitoes that carry malaria and dengue. Mr Egeland said perhaps the biggest challenge now “is the water and the sanitation and the emergency food and the emergency shelter for hundreds of thousands of homeless.” Frederick M. Burkle, Jr., at the Center for International Emergency, Disaster and Refugee Studies at Johns Hopkins University Medical Institutions in Kailua, Hawaii, told the Tribune all this would be expected after such a disaster, however, it must be confirmed from on the ground assessments. “We wait for results of assessments otherwise it’s a waste. Unfortunately, often times we produce a secondary disaster by sending too much of the wrong things too soon,” he said. Noting that the past few days have brought “loss and grief to the world that is beyond comprehension,” Mr Bush, who has been criticised for his silence in the wake of the enormous tragedy, said from his ranch in Crawford, Texas, “Together the world will cope with their loss. We will prevail over the destruction.” |
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Bad water, not corpses, main concern
Bangkok, December 30 Sewage-contaminated water is the main risk factor in the spread of deadly diseases like cholera, malaria and dengue fever and aid organisations are scrambling to get clean drinking water to the affected areas. ‘’There is no risk of epidemics because of dead bodies,’’ said Mr Harsaran Pandey, World Health Organisation (WHO) regional spokeswoman in New Delhi. Most agents carrying diseases did not survive long in the human body after death and the source of acute infections was more likely to be tsunami survivors who may already be carrying diseases, the WHO said. The giant walls of water which crashed ashore on Sunday destroyed safe water supplies for hundreds of villages and polluted what was left with sewage. It was this contaminated water which posed the greatest threat, the WHO said. The international health organisation has said the tsunami death toll, now at more than 87,000, could double if epidemics broke out in the affected countries. ‘’I could say many, many, many people could die if we are not able to reach people in a timely manner with safe water for the prevention of death from
water-borne diseases,’’ said Mr Pandey. ‘’Diseases are spread by contaminated water, drinking water and water used to clean food,’’ she said. The first symptom of contaminated water consumption is
diarrhoea and doctors in Sri Lanka and elsewhere are already reporting cases of diarrhoea and vomiting. ‘’If a person gets dehydrated from diarrhoea then that is when it gets serious and a person can die,’’ Mr Pandey said. The WHO and other international aid bodies are shipping tonnes of water purification tablets to Indonesia, Sri Lanka and the Maldives, while foreign navies are sending ships with desalination units to produce drinking water. However, while rotting corpses pose little threat to survivors, relief workers handling them face a risk of contracting tuberculosis, hepatitis, HIV, as well as gastro-intestinal infections such as diarrhoea, salmonellosis, typhoid fevers and cholera.
— Reuters |
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UN launches $ 130 m disaster appeal
United Nations, December 30 “We are launching from the country teams the following appeal for money needed immediately for a total of 130 million dollars,” UN chief disaster relief coordinator Jan Egeland told reporters yesterday. He said the first amount of 70 million dollars would go to Sri Lanka, 40 million dollars to Indonesia and 20 million to the Maldives islands.
— PTI |
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Queen gives ‘substantial’ donation
London, December 30 The money would most likely to be given to British charities with which the monarch is already associated as a patron, a Buckingham Palace spokesman said.
— AFP |
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Aziz, Fazl fail to end rift on key issues
Islamabad, December 30 The two leaders held a one-to-one meeting at the Prime Minister's House and discussed the overall political situation, but neither of them offered any concession to help defuse the government-opposition stand-off over President Musharraf's retaining the army office beyond December 31. During the meeting, Maulana Fazl reiterated the Opposition's viewpoint with regard to the MMA-government agreement on the issue. He also demanded inclusion of the religion column in the machine-readable passports. After their meeting, both leaders appeared before a group of journalists and said that the talks were held in a cordial atmosphere and hoped that the process would continue. While Prime Minister Aziz stressed the need for congenial atmosphere for strengthening the democratic process, Maulana Fazl demanded implementation of the MMA-government agreement which required the President to shed his uniform before December 31. Maulana Fazl turned down the Prime Minister's offer to consider MMA's reservations about the National Security Council if it softened its stand on the uniform issue. He told Mr Aziz that the two issues were separate and could not be mixed. Later talking to Dawn, Maulana Fazl said the meeting would neither affect MMA's plan to observe black day on the uniform issue on January 31, nor the opposition's planned agitation. He said he would start consulting other leaders of the MMA, including Qazi Hussain Ahmed, to convene a meeting of the alliance's supreme council to brief it on his talks with the Prime Minister. When asked about the outcome of the talks, the Prime Minister said: "It is a continuous process which will be continued." He said the meeting was necessary to create an atmosphere of understanding. He said Maulana Fazl had expressed reservations over certain issues which he had promised to look into. The Prime Minister said an environment of understanding which was necessary for the successful progress of democracy had been created as a result of his meeting with the MMA leader. |
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Japanese princess engaged to commoner
Tokyo, December 30 The princess, known informally as Nori, will leave the imperial family on her marriage to Yoshiki Kuroda (39) who works in the urban planning department at Tokyo city hall. Nori is the first princess to marry outside of the royal family since 1960 and any children she has will be ineligible to ascend the throne. "It is encouraging that the young couple have decided to spend their life together after almost two years of friendship," Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko said in a statement, top courtier Toshio Yuasa told a news conference to formally announce the engagement. A broadly smiling Kuroda bowed to reporters as he left his home in the morning and headed to the palace in central Tokyo. Female members of the royal family who leave it on marriage are entitled to a lump sum of up to $ 2.94 million and media reports say that judging from precedent the princess could receive around half that amount. The couple, who are long-time friends, both graduated from the private Gakushuin University in Tokyo and share an interest in wildlife.
— Reuters |
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