The Australian Pirates a threat to relief efforts
Reuters January 04, 2005 BANGKOK: The massive Asian tsunami relief operation faces absolute chaos and "a wall of devastation" in Indonesia, as well as the threat of plunder by pirates, relief groups warned yesterday. As aid logjams began to ease at Asian airports, bursting with hundreds of tonnes of emergency supplies, it was the destruction left by nature that was proving the biggest obstacle to the $US2billion ($2.57billion) relief operation, the biggest since World War II. "It's absolute chaos," said Titon Mitra of Care International, which is running 14 survivor camps in Indonesia's Aceh province. About two-thirds of the 144,000 people killed by the tsunami died there. Much of Aceh's west coast remained inaccessible eight days after the tsunami hit. Aid was being ferried up the coast to the port of Padang before heading by road to Medan and then Aceh. "Boats are used to deliver relief goods, but pirates are a real concern off the west coast," the UN Joint Logistics Centre said in a report on tsunami relief operations in Indonesia. In Sri Lanka, washed-out roads, broken bridges and widespread flooding meant swaths of Sri Lanka's eastern seaboard were also inaccessible. "I can only compare it to Europe after the Second World War," said World Vision Australia chief executive Tim Costello who has been working in Sri Lanka where at least 30,000 people died and where villages were wiped out. "It's going to take a generation" to rebuild the affected nations, he said. "Everywhere on that (Sri Lankan) coastline people are suffering, people are desperate and begging for food, begging for water -- that's the thing that just hit me." Aid workers fear some isolated survivors in the worst-affected countries may not be reached for weeks, despite a fleet of military helicopters dropping aid. "The emergency teams are arriving to be blocked by a wall of devastation. Everything is destroyed," Aly-Khan Rajani, Care Canada's program manager for Southeast Asia, said in Jakarta. Military forces have swung into rescue mode, with ships, aircraft, and thousands of troops, especially medical specialists, deployed from the US, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore, Germany, India, Pakistan, China and Japan. The US alone has sent 12,000 personnel, mainly in a 12-ship naval fleet. The UN Joint Logistics Centre, setting up operations in Jakarta, said a request for more military aid was likely to include a call for helicopter carriers for Indonesia, Sri Lanka and the Maldives. It would also need five air-traffic control units and fixed-wing aircraft capable of short take-off and landing and 100 boats or landing craft. The UN says 1.8 million victims needed food. Hundreds of thousands were homeless. *************************************************************************** Berdikusi dg Santun & Elegan, dg Semangat Persahabatan. Menuju Indonesia yg Lebih Baik, in Commonality & Shared Destiny. www.ppi-india.uni.cc *************************************************************************** __________________________________________________________________________ Mohon Perhatian: 1. Harap tdk. memposting/reply yg menyinggung SARA (kecuali sbg otokritik) 2. Pesan yg akan direply harap dihapus, kecuali yg akan dikomentari. 3. Lihat arsip sebelumnya, www.ppi-india.da.ru; 4. Forum IT PPI-India: http://www.ppiindia.shyper.com/itforum/ 5. Satu email perhari: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 6. No-email/web only: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 7. kembali menerima email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ppiindia/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
