Heavy Earthquake in Asia

[Waterman 0]

Latest unofficial death toll stands at 150,000.

I got a shock when I picked up the local news paper last night to see one of my old school friends picture on the front page, thankfully he was OK. He was on Shri-Lanka on a year out between school and university helping out with the local schools there teaching english etc. He was staying in a bed&breakfast type place when the wave hit but due to a sturdy hotel just infront of it, its wasn't quite as badly effected.

I also saw on the news that the US has upped its money to $350,000,000. The reason for this was to help with the long term situation. The British public has also raised around Å50,000,000 from what I've heard ontop of the governments offer.

[Koolkid101 0]

Time for China to step up to the plate, 2.6 million doesn't seem like an aweful lot for the 2nd most powerful nation in the world.

http://www.beijingportal.com.cn/7838/2004/12/29/1820@2448124.htm

[denoir 0]

Time for China to step up to the plate, 2.6 million doesn't seem like an aweful lot for the 2nd most powerful nation in the world.

http://www.beijingportal.com.cn/7838/2004/12/29/1820@2448124.htm

China is the third biggest economy in the world after the EU and the US. And yes, they could be pitching in more, but they're China. They seldom get involved in the affairs of other countries.

As for the EU and the US, it seems to be yet another pissing contest. The sums that have been donated exceed by far the requests that have been made, while little has been done in terms of coordinating where the money goes. Right now they're just throwing money at the govermnets of the affected countries without any specific plan. I am sure that the money will be needed over time for rebuilding, but there needs to be a specific plan to how the money will be used. Just giving a shitload of money isn't enough.

One interesting development is that the EU led by a French initiative is suggesting a permanent international taskforce that can be deployed on short notice to disaster areas. The idea is to create something similar to the UN peace keepers, but oriented on rescue, medical services and rebuilding.

[ralphwiggum 6]

http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/asiapcf/12/31/tsunami.peace/index.html

Quote[/b] ]UNITED NATIONS (CNN) -- The deadly tsunamis that destroyed large swaths of southern Asia could provide a chance for two civil wars in the region to at last come to an end, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan and U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell have said.

In Indonesia's Aceh province and in Sri Lanka, rebel leaders have vowed to work together with governments to provide critical support.

"We hope that this offers an opportunity both in Aceh and in Sri Lanka, and that the protagonists are now working together to bring support to those in need," Annan said at a news conference with Powell.

"And I hope that collaboration is not going to end with the crisis, and that they will be able to build on that and use this new dynamics to resolve their own differences, and we will be encouraging that.

http://www.cnn.com/2004....ex.html

Quote[/b] ](AP) -- For Patrick Green, the terrifying wave came in a trickle.

He and friend Becky Johnson were on a hotel elevator, on their way to the beach, where they planned to get one last hour of Thai sun before heading to the airport.

Outside, a tsunami had crushed the shore, killing more than 100,000 people, but in the elevator, the only sign that something was wrong came when the lights flickered and water began seeping through the doors ever so slowly.

His confused mind raced to find an explanation as "inhuman, indescribable" screams pierced the walls from outside.

His answer came when the elevator thrust downward and the doors burst open, revealing a raging river through the hotel. Dirty water, waist-deep and rising, gushed into the elevator. He and Johnson swam to a door. Outside, people, cars, tables and trees floated by.

They kept swimming and found the structure that would save them: a jungle gym in a nearby play area. They pulled a few other people aboard it, including a woman who clung furiously to her baby as she looked for her 5-year-old boy; they were later reunited.

Green and Johnson are among thousands of Americans who were caught in the tsunami devastation -- and among the many who have been recounting their ordeals in interviews and in e-mails home this week. Fourteen Americans died in the disaster, and the number is sure to rise as authorities get a clearer picture of the devastation.

Green and Johnson can thank the jungle gym and a palm-leaf roof for saving them.

As Johnson shouted prayers amid the flooding, the thatched roof lodged against the jungle gym, helping shelter them from the last and biggest wave -- one that swelled 10 feet over their heads.

"It was a freaky thing the tree protected us. We miraculously didn't get hit," Green recalled in a phone interview with The Associated Press from Singapore on Thursday night.

After the water calmed, Green and Johnson swam 150 yards to the hotel's main entrance. They took stairs to the building's roof, where they spent the rest of the day taking pictures and listening to panicked shrieks warning of additional waves that never came.

"It was ugly and awful. There are some images I will never forget, and some that I might never acknowledge again," said Green. "I am left with an immense respect for the power of nature."

Green and Johnson, both 28 and Pacific Northwest natives, are friends and first-year teachers at Singapore American School. They were vacationing during the holidays, since teachers abroad are encouraged not to return to the United States their first year to avoid homesickness.

[Akira 0]

Quote[/b] ]As for the EU and the US, it seems to be yet another pissing contest.

Typical, from both sides. Bush tries to undermine or show that the UN is un-needed, and the EU show that Bush is an ass. While the end result is that billions are given to the victims, its clouded and in the end the long-term rebuilding is forgotten among the fund raising pissing contest.

Well I am going to take Winters advice and email HR at the Texas Legislative Council and see if a fund can be set up. I'll let you all know on Monday.

Happy New Year by the way. I wish it was better...

EDIT:

"A clock stopped at the hour on Sunday that the tsunami struck the town of Banda Aceh in Indonesia."

[Bernadotte 0]

From: http://www.news.com.au/common....00.html

Quote[/b] ]...experts in Honolulu admitted they had forecast the disaster within 15 minutes of Sunday's earthquake off the coast of Sumatra but did not know who to pass the information to.

...

The countries that bore the brunt of the tsunami had no notice of what was coming but the earthquake, the largest for 40 years, had been monitored by the Pacific Tsunami Warning Centre in Honolulu.

"We don't have contacts in our address book for anybody in that part of the world," National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration director Charles McCreery said.

Why not?  

Just imagine NASA sighting a small asteroid on a collision course with the Earth, but saying nothing because it was not going to hit North America.

And on a more basic level, SE Asia's Pacific coast resorts have signs warning tourists to seek high ground if the ocean suddenly appears to recede.  Naturally, the locals there all know about this.  So why did so few inhabitants along the Bay of Bengal have this simple knowledge?

I don't understand all the fuss about costly early warning systems when there were so many cheap and simple ways that lives could have been spared?  ...Starting with giving the folks in the Honolulu Warning Center a few more phone numbers.

So sad.  

[denoir 0]

And on a more basic level, SE Asia's Pacific coast resorts have signs warning tourists to seek high ground if the ocean suddenly appears to recede.  Naturally, the locals there all know about this.  So why did so few inhabitants along the Bay of Bengal have this simple knowledge?

I don't understand all the fuss about costly early warning systems when there were so many cheap and simple ways that lives could have been spared?  ...Starting with giving the folks in the Honolulu Warning Center a few more phone numbers.

So sad.  

That could have saved a bunch of western tourists and people at the resorts. It would have however not done a significant difference overall.

The problem is in infrastructure. A majority of those killed live in fishing villages where they have hardly roads and for the most part no telephones or even electricity. There is in the present no way of communicating an alert. It will require years of social and economic development before those parts have reached the level where a warning could be delivered and distributed.

[Bernadotte 0]

And on a more basic level, SE Asia's Pacific coast resorts have signs warning tourists to seek high ground if the ocean suddenly appears to recede.  Naturally, the locals there all know about this.  So why did so few inhabitants along the Bay of Bengal have this simple knowledge?

I don't understand all the fuss about costly early warning systems when there were so many cheap and simple ways that lives could have been spared?  ...Starting with giving the folks in the Honolulu Warning Center a few more phone numbers.

So sad.  

That could have saved a bunch of western tourists and people at the resorts. It would have however not done a significant difference overall.

That?  Which that are you saying would have been ineffective?  ...The public awareness about natural warning signs or the phone calls from Honolulu?  I read a great story about a small remote island with no communication system that saved itself because their local folklore warned that whenever the land god shakes the sea god tries to swallow it.

The problem is in infrastructure.

Perhaps the problem is in saying their is only one problem.

The list of needs is very long and certainly includes infrastructure building.  However, I must place awareness building much higher on my list of cheap and simple ways to save lives.  After all, how many people (locals and tourists) came running to beach when the water suddenly pulled back?  Hey look everybody!!!  Free fish!!!

[brgnorway 0]

Quote[/b] ] I read a great story about a small remote island with no communication system that saved itself because their local folklore warned that whenever the land god shakes the sea god tries to swallow it.

Here's a link:

Quote[/b] ]"Our ancestors have a saying - if there is an earthquake run for your life," Darmili, the mayor of the island, said yesterday. "Thousands of our people were killed by a tsunami in 1907 and we have many earthquakes here."

Only five of 70,000 villagers on Simeulue were killed, all of them in the earthquake that struck at 7.55am last Sunday. Nobody perished in the five-metre-high walls of water that followed.

Sydney Morning Herald

[denoir 0]

That?  Which that are you saying would have been ineffective?  ...The public awareness about natural warning signs or the phone calls from Honolulu?  I read a great story about a small remote island with no communication system that saved itself because their local folklore warned that whenever the land god shakes the sea god tries to swallow it.

 

Both actually. To spread public awareness, you have to have some reliable and repeatable forms of communication. Sure some quaint little tribes will tell legends and tales of the event, but it's certainly something you can't count on.

Quote[/b] ]After all, how many people (locals and tourists) came running to beach when the water suddenly pulled back? Hey look everybody!!! Free fish!!!

Apart from showing a complete lack of knowledge or even intuition of how physics works on Earth, it says very little. People were curious and paid dearly for it. How do you know about it? Well, because of cell phones, cameras, the internet, news services etc

In the remote regions you don't have any of that. You don't have the means of mass communication. You don't have a school system etc..

I'm not saying we shouldn't try, but:

1) There is very little in reality that we could have done to prevent this high death tolls. This kind of shit doesn't happen very often in the region, and it would have been unreasonable to expect any massive investments in a warning system for a (then) improbable event. Furthermore even if we wanted to set up a warning system, the "level of civilization" is far to low in many regions to allow something like that.

2) It is still unlikely that we can do anything about it in the "backwards" regions that got hit so badly. A warning system or education about the effects of an earthquake require infrastructure that is 100-500 years ahead of its time in those regions.

[brgnorway 0]

Quote[/b] ]There is very little in reality that we could have done to prevent this high death tolls. This kind of shit doesn't happen very often in the region, and it would have been unreasonable to expect any massive investments in a warning system for a (then) improbable event.

I read right after the catastrophy started that there was statistically 700 years between incidents like that in this region. Last time it happened in Europe was in 1775 when Lissabon (Lisboa) was hit severely. Another eight thousand years ago it happend to the region where I live. So no, it doesn't happen that often.

[Bernadotte 0]

This kind of shit doesn't happen very often in the region, and it would have been unreasonable to expect any massive investments in a warning system for a (then) improbable event. Furthermore even if we wanted to set up a warning system, the "level of civilization" is far to low in many regions to allow something like that.

Yes, I agree and have already said as much.  I don't even think they should build one now.

Quote[/b] ]A warning system or education about the effects of an earthquake require infrastructure that is 100-500 years ahead of its time in those regions.

Knowing to seek high ground if the earth shakes or the sea pulls out does not require an advanced educational system.  There are far more primitive populations in around the Pacific that never needed to attend school to know this.  And there, it has already saved many lives.

There are even reports of wild animals having instinctively moved to higher ground in response to the warning signs.  It seems ironic that a people can be too primitive to be saved by modern means, yet too advanced to be saved by primitive means.

[denoir 0]

Knowing to seek high ground if the earth shakes or the sea pulls out does not require an advanced educational system.  There are far more primitive populations in around the Pacific that never needed to attend school to know this.  And there, it has already saved many lives.

Obviously not enough, right? The majority of the casualties are from areas where people live under very limited conditions.

I don't really think I understand what you are trying to say. If their level of education is enough as is, then what is your objection? How do you suggest we should act the next time, if you agree that any active action is unlikely to work due to the low-tech nature of those societies?

[Bernadotte 0]

Knowing to seek high ground if the earth shakes or the sea pulls out does not require an advanced educational system.  There are far more primitive populations in around the Pacific that never needed to attend school to know this.  And there, it has already saved many lives.

Obviously not enough, right? The majority of the casualties are from areas where people live under very limited conditions.

I meant there, in the Pacific archipelago, rather than in the Bay of Bengal.

Quote[/b] ]I don't really think I understand what you are trying to say. If their level of education is enough as is, then what is your objection? How do you suggest we should act the next time, if you agree that any active action is unlikely to work due to the low-tech nature of those societies?

I did not say their level of education was not enough or that it was.  I said that their level of awareness about Tsunami warning signs was not enough, given the levels of success such measures have realised in the Pacific rim.

Of course, it would have required some greater level of outreach than what is necessary in the Pacific where such events are less rare.  I still believe that such an awareness building program would have cost much less and saved more lives than a high tech warning system that might only sound once in a lifetime.

Finally, all the awareness in the world would not easily save places like Aceh and the Maldives where there just isn't any high ground to flee to.

[Ian Malcolm 0]

Well... don't know if it wasn't posted before.

https://www.nypost.com/news/worldnews/37579.htm

[brgnorway 0]

heres the rest of that pic, front of todays newspaper :/

[im]http://images.icnetwork.co.uk/upl/mirror/dec2004/1/1/00074691-385C-11D5-8D9F80BFB6FA0000.jpg[/img]

Believe it or not but the story with the woman ended well. She has been traced and her name is Karin Svärd. She managed to rescue her family. Finally a good story!

Story here - but in norwegian:

Dagbladet

[Ironsight 1]

Quote[/b] ]U.S. Begins Aid Delivery in Sumatra

Japan Becomes Top Donor With $500 Million Pledge

By Edward Cody

Washington Post Foreign Service

Sunday, January 2, 2005; Page A01

BANDA ACEH, Indonesia, Jan. 1 -- The first U.S. Navy helicopters fluttered in from an offshore carrier group Saturday and ferried aid to flattened towns along the western coast of Sumatra island largely cut off from help since a tsunami six days ago inflicted one of history's great disasters on Indonesia.

A day after the United States increased its contribution to the tsunami reconstruction effort to $350 million, Japan raised its pledge from $30 million to $500 million. With Japan's donation, the largest from any government, about $2 billion has been promised for emergency aid for an estimated 5 million people in South Asia and parts of Africa.

"It's the biggest outpouring of relief in such a short period of time," said Jan Egeland, the U.N. emergency relief coordinator. "International compassion has never been like this."

Aftershocks shook the region Saturday, including a 6.5-magnitude tremor 215 miles west of this hard-hit provincial capital, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. Smaller quakes were felt in northern Sumatra island and the remote Indian island groups of Nicobar and Andaman to the north.

Tropical rains poured down in intervals throughout the day, adding to the misery of tens of thousands of refugees living in tents or without shelter. Heavy rains also fell in Sri Lanka, creating flash floods that sent villagers running for high ground, according to news agency reports from Colombo, the capital.

Navy relief deliveries, carried out by a dozen specially fitted SH-60 Bravo helicopters from the USS Abraham Lincoln, marked the start of a large-scale international relief operation that residents of devastated Aceh province have been awaiting for nearly a week. Relief officials said the deliveries of food, water and medicine were particularly welcome along the shore south of Banda Aceh, where the wall of water destroyed a series of bridges and left the main road impossible to navigate.

"We are basically here to do whatever is needed," said Capt. Larry Burt of Lamore, Calif., who commanded the Navy's first group to arrive at Sultan Iskandar Muda Airport in Banda Aceh.

"I hope to get more stuff in here and start delivering it," said Cmdr. Frank Michael of Dallas, Pa., who piloted one of the craft.

The dull-gray Navy helicopters, usually deployed to hunt submarines, flew in from the Lincoln carrier group, which was steaming a few miles east of Banda Aceh in the now-tranquil Indian Ocean. With help from Australian and Indonesian military personnel, U.S. forces loaded supplies for immediate delivery southward.

According to civilian relief officials who flew over the disaster zone, significant relief is needed in coastal areas. Indonesian navy ships have delivered supplies to Meulaboh, a destroyed port 110 miles south of here, they said, but thousands of homeless and hungry victims have lined the main road north and south of the town, looking in vain for shelter and food since the tsunami washed away their villages.

As Burt and Michael spoke on the tarmac, C-130 Hercules transport planes from the Australian, U.S. and Indonesian militaries whined onto the runways with deliveries of more relief supplies. Singaporean Super Puma military helicopters joined Indonesian air force craft churning up the air, while trucks drove in and out picking up cargo. After days during which foreign governments seemed slow to respond to Indonesia's massive tragedy, there was a sense of sudden acceleration in the international relief operation.

Alwi Shihab, coordinating minister for social welfare, defended his efforts against complaints from many victims and Indonesian rescue volunteers that Indonesian and international officials were slow in getting started. "It's not that we are doing nothing," he said at a news conference here.

For the first time since the tsunami struck, heavy equipment such as front-end loaders was seen pushing away debris and mud from Aceh's destroyed city center. But soldiers continued to pick up bodies from the streets and most of the city remained without utilities and a working government.

Because many local officials were killed, Shihab said, the Interior Ministry will fly in more than 300 officials from Jakarta, the capital, to staff provincial and municipal administrations across Aceh province. Seeking to give an idea of the scope of the difficulty he faces, Shihab said 150,000 people made homeless by the disaster have crowded into 20 different refugee camps in Banda Aceh, without counting the thousands who have found refuge with relatives or are still wandering flattened villages along the western coast.

Full article

[iNeo 0]

heres the rest of that pic, front of todays newspaper :/

]http://images.icnetwork.co.uk/upl....]

Believe it or not but the story with the woman ended well. She has been traced and her name is Karin Svärd. She managed to rescue her family. Finally a good story!

http://expressen.se/content/1/c6/22/46/85/c2ba6ccb.jpg

Story here - but in norwegian:

Dagbladet

The family is from Sweden though

[brgnorway 0]

The family is from Sweden though

and you certainly deserved a good story considering your loss of swedish lives. I also read somewhere that after the name list of missing persons was released to the public the number was reduced. Good news after all!

[walker 0]

Hi all

More on the young British school girl warned those on her beach there was a Tidal Wave aproaching. This version identifies the teacher who taught her about Tsunamis and earthquakes at school.

http://www.itv.com/news/world_1535151.html

Identifying the warning signs can help and teaching such things in all schools round the world should now be compulsory.

That said as I already mentioned simple storm defenses protected all those on the Thai resort of Railay where the near identical nearby resort of Phi Phi to its NW was obliterated and the island resort of Ko Lanta to its SE had many casualties despite being less popular.

Clearly two lessons to be learned proper beach defenses for all towns and resorts, and some simple compulsory survival training for typical emergency situations car crashes, fire, flood/tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanos and first aid lessons at school, include swimming in that too.

Kind Regards Walker

[denoir 0]

 and you certainly deserved a good story considering your loss of swedish lives.

There has been certainly better news this morning. They are very rapidly removing people from the "presumed missing" list. Yesterday 2.915 people were missing (down from 3,500+) and during the night and morning they have now written off additional 1,554 people.

As they've added people to the list, and the review isn't complete no current estimates exist, but it is certainly looking much better for Sweden than it did a few days ago.

We might end up with "only" around 1,000 casualties, rather than the initially projected 4,000.

[brgnorway 0]

 and you certainly deserved a good story considering your loss of swedish lives.

There has been certainly better news this morning. They are very rapidly removing people from the "presumed missing" list. Yesterday 2.915 people were missing (down from 3,500+) and during the night and morning they have now written off additional 1,554 people.

As they've added people to the list, and the review isn't complete no current estimates exist, but it is certainly looking much better for Sweden than it did a few days ago.

We might end up with "only" around 1,000 casualties, rather than the initially projected 4,000.

That is indeed good news! At 1130 today they'll release the norwegian list too - and it would be nice if the 1400 and something was reduced as well.

Edit: The number of missing norwegians has been reduced from 1430 to 275 after the "missing list" was published by the police!

[Akira 0]

No go for the Texas Legislative Council Tsunami Relief Fund. But HR here did send out a mass email to all in the capitol directing them to where they CAN donate. I donated to UNICEF.

[DracoPaladore 0]

Quote[/b] ]PM steps up, finally

Martin doubles assistance after flying home from vacation

Cabinet also pledges long-term support for reconstruction

BRUCE CAMPION-SMITH AND PETER CALAMAI

OTTAWA BUREAU

OTTAWA?After a week of criticism about Canada's slow response to the southern Asia tsunami, Prime Minister Paul Martin yesterday swung into action, doubling Canada's cash contribution to $80 million.

Martin, who returned late Saturday from a vacation in Morocco, also pledged long-term support for the reconstruction of the battered region.

After Martin met with key members of his cabinet and with diplomats from the affected region, it was also announced that:

The military's Disaster Assistance Relief Team (DART) would be deployed for the first time in five years to help victims of the tragedy.

The Prime Minister will visit the Greater Toronto Area today to meet with community representatives.

The government's commitment of $80 million includes its pledge to match donations by individual Canadians, which Martin said now total $36 million.

In his first public appearance since the disaster hit a little over a week ago, Martin said the scale of the tragedy, which has killed more than 144,000 people, including at least five Canadians, is "beyond measure or human comprehension."

Another 150 Canadians remain unaccounted for in the region, mostly in Thailand.

"It's a disaster that touched the global conscience and evoked a global response," Martin said in the Commons' foyer.

"To those Canadian families who have lost a loved one, to those with a missing relative, to any and all touched by this tragedy, I want to tell you that Canada and the world stands with you," he said.

Regarding the military's disaster team, Martin said: "The DART has been put on alert and as soon as we have a confirmation that the proper site has been put in place and that facilities are ready to receive them, we will be sending them over."

Defence Minister Bill Graham said later that the team ? equipped to provide clean water, medical aid and engineering help ? would likely depart Thursday for the hard-hit Ampara region on Sri Lanka's east coast, where thousands of people were killed when the tsunami stormed ashore just over a week ago.

Yesterday, flags on federal buildings were lowered to half-staff where they'll remain until Saturday, when a national memorial will be held in Ottawa at noon to remember "all those lost in the tragedy," Martin said.

Today, Martin will visit Greater Toronto, stopping first at Markham's Cedarwood Public School, where many of the students are Sri Lankan. The principal opened the school last week to give children a place to relax while their parents dealt with the disaster.

Later, the Prime Minister will be in Scarborough for a discussion with local leaders of the southern Asian communities.

Flanked by representatives of four Asian nations hit hardest by the tidal waves, Martin pledged yesterday that Canada would help with the costly rebuilding of the region.

"Through this difficult time and far beyond, we will be there to comfort, to assist, to help in any way we can. Not simply for a week or a month or even a year, but as long as it takes, for as long as you need us ? for that is the Canadian way," Martin said.

The Sri Lankan high commissioner, M. N. Geethangani de Silva, said the new relief assistance was "very encouraging" but the pledge of long-term help for reconstruction was even more important.

"The infrastructure rebuilding process will be enormous ? roads, railway, schools, hospitals, houses," she said in an interview.

De Silva said Martin had told her and other diplomats from tsunami-damaged countries to consult their governments "and let us know specifically what could be done."

The ranking Indonesian diplomat in Canada, Sadewo Joedo, also expressed gratitude, but said the bigger challenge lies ahead. "We will need a lot more to rebuild. Much of our infrastructure is totally destroyed," he told the Star.

To encourage further donations from individual Canadians, the federal government yesterday said it would allow charitable donations made up to Jan. 11 to be claimed as tax deductions on 2004 tax returns.

"No matter how great the response, we know that more is required," Martin said.

"Canada stands ready to do more.

"My main concern is to deliver the financial and the physical help that these people need."

Other measures announced by Martin yesterday include:

Tapping Canada's stockpile of emergency supplies to send 20,000 blankets, 40 electrical generators, 15 mobile feeding kitchens and thousands of water purification tablets.

Sending 10 RCMP forensic specialists to Thailand to help identify bodies. The RCMP forensic lab in Ottawa is a world leader in DNA identification of remains.

Helping Canadians bring family members from the affected regions to settle here. Martin also asked Immigration Minister Judy Sgro to consult with affected communities and report back in a week on what further actions are needed.

Today, three cabinet ministers leave for the region to see the devastation firsthand and help coordinate Canada's assistance.

Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew and Aileen Carroll, minister of international cooperation, will represent Canada at a meeting of international donors in Jakarta on Thursday. From there, Pettigrew will travel on to Thailand.

Carroll will visit Banda Aceh, an Indonesian town virtually destroyed by the killer waves.

Health Minister Ujjal Dosanjh, who flies today to India and Sri Lanka from Vancouver, said Canada is focusing on long-term reconstruction needs in the tsunami-shattered region.

"In places like Sri Lanka we would have the potential of playing a larger role if we're able to do things right," the minister said in an interview.

Dosanjh said Canada's help with relief and reconstruction in Sri Lanka could translate into influence in making peace between government forces and Tamil insurgents.

During a two-day visit Friday and Saturday, the minister said, he hopes to see relief efforts in Tamil-controlled regions of eastern Sri Lanka as well as government-controlled areas.

"It's important for politicians to get a first-hand look at how things are going," he said.

Dosanjh stops first in India and will return there to help with preparations for a visit by Martin planned for mid-month.

However, aides said yesterday that the timing of Martin's own trip to Asia, due to begin in just a couple of weeks, is likely to change, but they wouldn't comment on whether the Prime Minister is trying to schedule a visit specifically to the countries hit by the disaster.

The federal government has been criticized for dragging its feet in the days after the crisis, with key ministers out of town and paltry early offers of cash.

But Martin tackled those gripes head-on yesterday, saying, per capita, Canada ranked among the most generous donors.

And he defended his decision to remain on vacation in Morocco rather than return to the nation's capital to oversee Canada's response in person as one of the world's biggest humanitarian crises unfolded.

"I had a full office set up as soon as this event took place. I was on the phone either directing the situation here in Canada or on the phones with the other world leaders," Martin said.

"The opportunity to do the work was there and I was doing it. In terms of the coordination of the Canadian effort, I could do it from there," he said.

Still, back in Ottawa, Martin was eager to show yesterday that he was in control.

He chaired a morning meeting of cabinet ministers steering the relief efforts and then met with the diplomats from Indonesia, Thailand, India and Sri Lanka to discuss their needs.

Final confirmation that the disaster team will depart this week is expected today, after a reconnaissance team has checked whether an airport in the Ampara region can handle the giant Russian-built Antonov transport jet that will shuttle in the team's 250 containers of supplies.

"The government of Sri Lanka wants it. The question is can it get to Ampara. If we get a green light from the team that are up there ... it will go," Graham said.

He defended the decision not to deploy the team earlier in the week, saying the government had to ensure the estimated $15 million to $20 million cost of deploying the team wouldn't be better spent helping out in some other way.

The 200-member team can provide primary medical care and supply 50,000 litres a day of clean water.

Since the tsunami, the remote Ampara coastal area has been hit with heavy rains and flash floods, forcing the evacuation of camps housing survivors and halting relief convoys.

[denoir 0]

The number of confirmed missing Swedish tourists is now 827. For an additional 1,495 the status is unknown, presumed missing. In the count that they did during the last two days about 50% of the missing people turned out to be alive. If that trend holds, the end number of killed will be around 1,500.

Per capita that puts Sweden in second place after Indonesia.