Swath of destruction of Banda Aceh in Aceh province northwest of Indonesia.
(AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)
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PM Update: Death toll approaches 150,000.
Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 31 December 2004 (23h00 GMT): - - The death toll in the tsunami disaster is approaching 150,000, United Nations humanitarian chief Jan Egeland says. "What we see is that the figures may be approaching 150,000 dead. The vast majority of those are in Indonesia and Aceh, which is the least assessed area because of logistical constraints, and it may therefore rise further," Egeland told reporters.
He added that the final number of dead will never be known. "We will never ever have the absolute definite figure because there are many fishermen and villages which have just gone and we have no chance of finding out how many they were," he said. (AP)
AM Update: Death toll soars to over 125,000 and it is still rising.
Surfersvillage Global Surf News, 31 December 2004 (04h00 GMT): - - BANDA ACEH - Asia's tsunami death toll soared above 125,000 and aid agencies warned many more people, particularly children, could die in epidemics, ushering in a sombre New Year's Eve for the world.
While authorities rushed to identify and bury the dead, many reduced to rotting corpses after days in tropical heat, a UN masterminded relief operation rapidly focused more on Thursday on getting food and clean water to millions of survivors. "This is an unprecedented, global catastrophe and it requires an unprecedented, global response," UN Secretary General Kofi Annan told reporters on Thursday as UN officials said up to five million people were without basic services.
UN emergency relief coordinator Jan Egeland said the World Health Organisation had informed him that diarrhoea and respiratory diseases were on the rise after Sunday's disaster. "We could be in a situation that more children could die from diarrhoea in the next weeks than those who were killed by the tsunami," said Egeland.
The Asian disaster cast a long shadow over the world's New Year celebrations, especially as about 5,000 foreign tourists -- mostly Europeans -- were still missing. Sweden, Norway and Finland, hard hit by the disaster as many Scandinavians like to escape their cold winters for the Asian sunshine, plan to fly flags at half mast to start the New Year.
Fast rising death toll.
The death toll more than doubled on Thursday with still no clear picture of conditions in some remote villages as well as islands around India and Indonesia. Rescue workers pressed on into isolated villages devastated by a disaster that could yet eclipse a cyclone that struck Bangladesh in 1991, killing 138,000 people.
Indonesia's Health Ministry said just under 80,000 people -- some 28,000 more than previously announced -- had died in northern Aceh province. The airport of the main city, Banda Aceh, was busy with aid flights, but residents said little was getting through to them. Hungry crowds jostling for aid biscuits and besieged people delivering them in the city. Some drivers dared not stop.
"Some cars come by and throw food like that. The fastest get the food, the strong one wins. The elderly and the injured don't get anything. We feel like dogs," said Usman, 43. "This isn't just a situation of giving out food and water. Entire towns and villages need to be rebuilt from the ground up," said Rod Volway of CARE Canada, whose emergency team was one of the first into Aceh.
Many villages and resorts from Indonesia to Sri Lanka are now mud-covered rubble, blanketed with the stench of corpses. In Indonesia, thousands of bodies decomposing in the tropical heat were tumbled into mass graves. Health officials said polluted water posed a much greater threat than corpses.
Somalia wave victims 'forgotten'
Somalia has largely been forgotten by the international community in its response to help victims of Sunday's tsunami, the United Nations says. Jan Egeland, the UN's emergency relief co-ordinator, said UN personnel had only just reached villages affected. Aid workers have described a scene of devastation on the Somali island of Hafun, a fishing community of 2,500.
The floods killed 120 in Somalia with 35 missing and some 50,000 displaced, its prime minister said on Thursday. Displaced families on Hafun desperately need aid as they have no clean water, food, medicine or shelter as most of their homes and possession were swept away.
More than 130 people are known to have died in countries along the East African coast when waves swept 7,000km (4,000 miles) from the epicentre leaving a trail of smashed buildings and boats. In Madagascar, more than 1,000 people were made homeless while a village in northern Mauritius was submerged for almost three hours following the surges.
The small Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia - home to a US naval base - escaped unharmed as it was forewarned by the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre in Hawaii.
Survivors organise relief work.
In Sri Lanka's worst-hit area Ampara, residents ran relief efforts themselves, going round with loudhailers, asking people to donate pots and pans, buckets of fresh water and sarongs. Dutch, German and Swiss forensic teams flew to Thailand to help identify now hard-to-recognise bodies by collecting dental evidence, DNA samples, fingerprints, photographs and X-rays.
People worldwide opened their hearts and wallets to give millions of dollars to help relief efforts, jamming phone lines and Web sites and outpacing governments in their generosity. Britain's Disasters Emergency Committee said it had collected more than $39 million, less than a day after launching an appeal on behalf of 12 top British charities. "It's quite a phenomenal response," a spokeswoman said. Amazon.com collected $4.8 million in donations from online shoppers at its Web site.
Bush, like other world leaders facing criticism for what some say was a tardy early response to the crisis, said he was sending a team headed by his brother, Florida Governor Jeb Bush, and US Secretary of State Colin Powell to assess Asia's needs. The United States said a pledge of $35 million was just a start, and sent an aircraft carrier group towards Sumatra and other ships including a helicopter carrier to the Bay of Bengal.
The World Bank offered $250 million in relief, bringing total international aid to nearly $500 million. The Paris Club group of creditors was to examine a debt moratorium for countries hit by the tsunami that devastated southern Asia, a source close to the Club said. German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder said he would propose to the European Union that top industrial nations form bilateral "partnerships" with tsunami-hit countries. "Our states for corresponding areas there. Our cities for their cities and our villages for their villages," Schroeder said in his New Year's address. "German schools and children, supported by their parents, could sponsor schools over there."
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