Heavy Earthquake in Asia

[brgnorway 0]

The norwegian government is upping it's monetary aid to $150 million and will give more when nessecary.

[SpongeBob 0]

Quote[/b] ]Somalia Seeks Aid for 50,000 Victims

1 hour, 26 minutes ago

By RODRIQUE NGOWI, Associated Press Writer

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tm....inter=1

NAIROBI, Kenya - Somalia appealed Monday for international aid to victims of the deadly tsunami that slammed its shores, with an official saying at least 50,000 people urgently need food, water, shelter and medical help after losing their homes and livelihoods.

Somali presidential spokesman Yusuf Mohamed Ismail said 24 countries ? including the United States, Italy, German and Saudi Arabia ? have pledged to send relief to Somalia. But nothing has arrived more than a week after a massive underwater earthquake off Indonesia some 3,000 miles away sent lethal waves as far as the east coast of Africa.

"We are very happy that relief supplies have arrived in Asia, which was hit the hardest by the tragedy, but Somalia ? which has been ravaged from a 13-year civil war, drought and political neglect ? also needs emergency help to deal with the latest calamity," Yusuf told The Associated Press.

At least 200 people were killed and many others remain missing after the waves hammered the Somali coast Dec. 26, Yusuf said.

Somalia is still struggling to assess the damage. The U.N. food aid agency has sent out four teams to assess humanitarian needs and distribute aid to affected Somalis, spokeswoman Laura Melo said.

But the presence of large numbers of anti-aircraft guns owned by local warlords prevented U.N. officials from flying over parts of the Somali coastline last week to check on damage in those areas.

Some affected areas are so remote they could take five days to reach from the nearest usable airstrip, U.N. officials said.

Some tsunami victims are receiving food aid from U.N. agencies, which diverted relief intended for Somalis suffering from a four-year drought, Yusuf and U.N. officials said.

Most of the victims are from the Indian Ocean coastline of the semiautonomous region of Puntland, including the northeastern Hafun island, which was hardest hit by the tsunami.

The waves were triggered by a huge undersea earthquake centered off the Indonesian island of Sumatra, about 2,800 miles across the Indian Ocean. More than 139,000 were killed in Asia.

Somalis abroad also are raising funds to help the survivors, Yusuf said.

[Akira 0]

Quote[/b] ]

WORLD

Expert: I tried to warn of tsunami

PHUKET, Thailand (Reuters) -- A Thai expert says he tried to warn the government a deadly tsunami might be sweeping towards tourist-packed beaches, but couldn't find anyone to take his calls.

Samith Dhammasaroj said Monday he was sure a tsunami was coming as soon as he heard about the massive Dec. 26 earthquake off Indonesia's Sumatra island that measured magnitude 9.0 -- the world's biggest in 40 years.

"I tried to call the director-general of the meteorological office, but his phone was always busy," Samith said as he described his desperate attempts to generate an alert which might have saved thousands of lives.

"I tried to phone the office, but it was a Sunday and no-one was there," said the former chief of the meteorological department now charged with setting up an early warning disaster system for Thailand.

"I knew that one day we would have this type of tsunami. I warned that there would be a big disaster," he told reporters.

"Everyone laughed at me and said I was a bad guy who wanted to ruin the tourist industry," he added.

The tsunami took just 75 minutes to hit the beaches and islands of Thailand's Andaman Sea coast, 600 km (375 miles) from the earthquake's epicenter.

Now more than 5,100 people are dead, nearly half of them foreign tourists who abandoned Europe's cold, dark winter for golden sands and turquoise seas, and left 3,800 missing, nearly 1,700 of them foreigners.

Downstairs from where he spoke, dozens of foreigners were still scanning message boards, trying to match grisly photos of bloated, battered bodies to the smiling pictures of missing friends and relatives.

"I feel very sorry for the people who died," Samith said. "I will make sure this thing does not happen again."

The early warning system for Thailand -- which has not had a natural disaster in living memory worse than floods during the annual monsoon -- would be ready in six months, Samith promised.

"We will make the system very efficient," he said.

Roaring sea

Preliminary investigations by a team of six Japanese experts showed that the wall of water hit beaches along the Thai coast at different speeds and heights, with the phenomenon exacerbated by a high tide that fed the tsunami as it neared land.

Khao Lak beach, lined with hotels and resorts especially popular among Scandinavians and Germans just north of Phuket, took the worst hit from waves up to 10.5 meters (34 ft) high.

They roared up Khao Lak's gently sloping beach at speeds of up to 8 meters a second (29 kilometers an hour), said Professor Hideo Matsutomi, who led the Japanese team.

"There have been six major tsunami in this region since 1797, but I think this last tsunami was the biggest," he said.

Tsunami are much more frequent in the Pacific Ocean and countries there have long established an early warning system to protect them from disaster.

Samith said countries in the Indian Ocean had to follow suit and set up a network of underwater sea monitors which might cost as little as $20 million to build.

Warnings of imminent inundations would be sent out automatically on television and radio and by text messages to mobile phones.

The system would help woo back tourists scared away by the mass loss of life, Samith said.

"No-one can predict an earthquake, but you can predict a tsunami," he said. "We will build a good system."

"We will help tourists come back to Thailand."

Link

[Hjaldar 0]

[url=

If this is real, it makes me wanna sink the christofascist authors somewhere in the sea. How can't they be ashamed.

[DracoPaladore 0]

If this is real, it makes me wanna sink the christofascist authors somewhere in the sea. How can't they be ashamed.

As one mp board member said, it's real. I'm not overly surprised, since i've already seens photos of his other protests. Billboards saying things like "Thank god for AIDS", as well as the situation where Sheperds funeral was abominated by these pshycopaths.

[denoir 0]

Runway accident hampers aid bid [bBC]

Quote[/b] ]

The only airport in Aceh province was closed early on Tuesday after an aid plane hit a cow on the runway.

On a grim note, the first bodies are arriving to Sweden:

[Placebo 29]

Link to another forum removed, you should all know the rules, linking to another forum, especially a forum with little regard for the content of things posted is a no no.

[bonko the sane 2]

yesterday i saw a load of footage of "tragedy tourists" taking pics on mass graves, sitting on corpses and smiling...looked like a regular day out at trafalgar square...WTF!!!! those ppl should made to bury the bodies and debries as punishment for inhuman behaviour.

[brgnorway 0]

Quote[/b] ]

Michael Schumacher donates 10 million dollars to Asian tsunami victims

BERLIN (AFP) - Seven-time world Formula One champion Michael Schumacher of Germany has donated 10 million dollars to the victims of last week's Asian tsunamis, his manager Willi Weber said during a German telethon.  

"The dawning of the New Year has not been as joyful for us this year because of the catastrophe in Asia. We sympathise with the victims in their grief," Schumacher said.

The death toll from the massive December 26 earthquake and resulting tidal waves around the Indian Ocean neared 146,000 Tuesday.

Well done!

Link here

[Hjaldar 0]

Just recieved: Germany helps with 500 Million Euros.

Edit: Link here

http://edition.cnn.com/2005....ex.html

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

Here is something to take pride in and I DO

Germany is leading the world by providing 500 Mio Euro to the countries that have suffered from the Tsunami.

Japan, in contrast, is spending 300 Mio and the US 250 Mio.

[IsthatyouJohnWayne 0]

All very good and praiseworthy in principle but what surely matters is what actually gets delivered and the effects on the ground. As i recall, plenty of countries made 'pledges' for funding to Afghanistan much of which has now fizzled out. If in a few years time this is forgotten and perhaps there are diverting disasters it is doubtful if all the money 'pledged' will actually arrive.

But still, this show of international generosity must be a good thing (even if mostly due to media therefore public attention).

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

surely you are right but those 500 Mio have already been approved by our parliament. In germany that means it must be put into action and those funds cannot be redirected.

What I am fearing now is mainly corruption and bureaucracy. I am not so scared about Thailand since they have tackled corruption in the past very successfuly... but the other countries?

[brgnorway 0]

Very good Germany! Untill recently I believe that the official number given by a national government was in favour of Norway ($180mill) - relative to our number of inhabitants that is (4.5mill) .

Anyway, there are lots of factors that should be considered in the future, but for now the most important thing is to get the instantly needed help to the places it matters most. After then it's time to think about aspects of aid that has been proven not to work as intended before.

What IsthatyouJohnWayne mentioned is of importance actually! The earthquake catastrophy of Bam still sees people living in tents ONE year after the incident took place! Much of the money "promised" was never send in the first place because governments decided to "cut" and "balance out" the monetary aid. Same thing with Afghanistan.

The next important step is that when the rebuilding starts the various organisations may actually do a lot of damage to the local communities. By bringing in massive help such as materials and industrial products bought in our part of the world - from companies specialised in producing relief orientated products. This is fine as long as the local communities private, industrial and financial sector is not forgotten. Even though this would lead to a relief financed bonanza the most important thing is to let them decide where, what and how . This is probably why the International Red Cross have such an high esteem around the globe.

Humanitarian relief is good and helps the image of ourselves as good persons doing good deeds. Please do not forget that in many cases one also wanted to help our own relief orientated industry as well as the poor bastards somewhere in Africa. Also, much of the help given to various african nations have actually made it worse in the long run. Grazing areas and pastures destroyed for all time, wells abandonded as they have been emptied, destroyed "centralised families" , children forced away from their families to go to school etc. The list is long.

Edit: I forgot to mention the problem of not differentiating between relief work and aid as developement work

It's unfortunate to mix the two of them - and the last one is ethically difficult never the less.

[der bastler 0]

Here is something to take pride in and I DO

Germany is leading the world by providing 500 Mio Euro to the countries that have suffered from the Tsunami.

Japan, in contrast, is spending 300 Mio and the US 250 Mio.

Er, this is not the contest "Who is the greatest donator in the world"!

I don't remember such an effort after Bam 2003. Or Bangladesh 2004 (millions of people on the run, 1000something dead).

In fact I have to question this action. Germany can hardly afford half a billion EUR regarding debts of 1.5 trillion EUR and additional annual debts 43+ billion EUR. In 2005 social problems in Germany will get worse due to reforms (read: cuts).

Spiegel writes that the 500 Mio EUR will be paid over a period of 3-5 years and only if they are needed by certrain projects like water treatment, education etc...

Ok, you'll say "how can bastler think of money during such a time of crisis", but let's face it: None of the contries hit by the tsunamis would have received any help at all under normal circumstances (i.e. no flood). There are many countries around the globe which need continuous help (not just money peeks just because it is popular) and which are now displaced simply by the fact that this tsunami disaster is much more present.

To me a bad taste remains... PR... and it is getting worse with people competing in donation proposals...

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

Bastler. Better to pay now than not to pay anything at all. Better to send 500.000.000 to rebuild South East Asia than 1Billion to bomb Iraq.

Sounds idealistic and naive, well it is. But considering the waste of our government for useless projects such as TollCollect & Holzmann I believe you are overestimating the impact of 1/2Billion Dollars.

Those people have less to live with than our unhappy HartzIV victims, better keep that in mind. It is important you do not perceive it as "wasted money" only because we never paid Africa the same amount of money.

[brgnorway 0]

One quick question Albert. What is "projects such as TollCollect & Holzmann& HartzIV" ?

[feersum.endjinn 6]

What good it is to promise billion dollars if there is no way to spend it there? People can't eat dollars and 100 euros in your hand do no good to prevent you from getting cholera if there just isn't anything you can buy it with.

Most of these sums being thrown around are just politicians fishing for votes and making their voters feel good about themselves. Yes, money helps but there really isn't much you can do with just money, since there are no roads, no railways, no gas stations where aid convoys can refuel, basically only way to deliver aid to worst hit areas is by helicopters and it is both slow and inefficient. Shipping aid by sea takes time and cargo ships can't dock or unload if there's nothing left of port infrastructure and there is finite amount of air transport capacity in the world and planes can't land if airport is destroyed or everyone able to repair and maintain it is dead, sick or injured.

And since people have been mentioning Iraq and Afghanistan here - main reason why nothing happens there is that there just is no security. Afghan government governs little more than Kabul and you can't repair schools or roads if people building them get shot at daily or kidnapped and beheaded on Al-Jazeera. If you think that giving 10 billion to bank account of Iraqi government would magically make it all better you need to stop smoking crack. You need that 100 billion first to kill bad folks before you can use even single dollar for reconstruction.

[der bastler 0]

What is "projects such as TollCollect & Holzmann& HartzIV" ?

TollCollect: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toll_Collect

Company that builds a management/payment system for the German highway toll; it is expected that this system a) is expanded from heavy trucks to light trucks (and cars?) and b) will be exported to other European countries. Release was delayed while the old highway toll was down... several Mio gone...

Holzmann: A PR action of our chancellor. Dumped several Mio EUR in a company to preserve jobs. Disappeared rather fast out of the news after it went wrong (what was obvious). At least the chancellor got his 15 minutes...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hartz_concept

Quote[/b] ]Hartz IV

The Hartz IV reform was voted in by the Bundestag on December 16 2003 and by the Bundesrat on July 9 2004. This part of the reform brings together unmployment benefits and social security benefits, leaving them both at approximately the lower level social security claimants received. Until 2005, unemployment benefit claimants received benefits based on their salary previous to losing their job, getting up to three quarters of their last salary.

From 2005, the full unemployment pay (Arbeitslosengeld I) will only be received for one year - less than half the previous length of time - and will be followed by the lower Arbeitslosengeld II if the claimant fits the requirements (see below). Before 2005, two years of full unemployment pay was followed by Arbeitslosenhilfe, unemployment benefits which were higher than the basic social security benefits, depending on how much money the unemployed person had previously earned.

Whether or not a claimant receives Arbeitslosengeld II will depend on his or her savings, life insurance and the income of husband or wife: only when these reserves are used up will a claimant get money from the state. The government believes this will mean that half a million claimants (out of 2.1 million today) will no longer be eligible for benefits. The Institute for Economic Research in Halle estimates that the average long-term unemployed person will receive approximately 350 euro per month compared to 530 before the reform.

The job agencies will also undergo some reforms: more workers will help unemployed people find work, the figures changing from 400 unemployed people per worker to fewer than 75 for 25-year-olds and 150 for people over that age.

Annotation: One has to pay for the unemployment benefits. It is an insurance, whereas the social security benefits are pure charity. Merging both into one is very problematic...

[Akira 0]

Here is something to take pride in and I DO

Germany is leading the world by providing 500 Mio Euro to the countries that have suffered from the Tsunami.

Japan, in contrast, is spending 300 Mio and the US 250 Mio.

If you want to play that game Australia (760+M) is actually the largest donor

Japan has actually pledged 500M (third), and the US is at 350M (fourth...plus there are already US ships and deliveries in the area).

EDIT: All numbers in $, but as someone pointed out...this isn't a pissing contest.

[kavoven 4]

It's the german Maut system(do you call in in english like that)

That means that all the trucks have to pay 12.6 Cent per kilometer they're driving on german highways.

The system launched this year, but it should have one year ago and there was big trouble concerning the enterprise which is actually the producer of the system, because it's based on satelites

I think it cost Germany around one bilion euro, until they could solve the problems...

[DracoPaladore 0]

EDIT: All numbers in $, but as someone pointed out...this isn't a pissing contest.

Unfortunatly, it seems so. It seems that governments are being pressured to throw money at Asia because others are giving out more. While I feel sorry and heartbroken for the Asians, and that I find that my government is slow in reaction and should do more, throwing money at the disaster won't neccesarily make it go away and homes rebuilt.

That's why I feel the need for more disaster responsce teams, who help build facilities, purify water, fortify flood areas, etc.

[llauma 0]

EDIT: All numbers in $, but as someone pointed out...this isn't a pissing contest.

Unfortunatly, it seems so. It seems that governments are being pressured to throw money at Asia because  others are giving out more. While I feel sorry and heartbroken for the Asians, and that I find that my government is slow in reaction and should do more, throwing money at the disaster won't neccesarily make it go away and homes rebuilt.

That's why I feel the need for more disaster responsce teams, who help build facilities, purify water, fortify flood areas, etc.

It's not just governments but normal people too.. It seems like everyone should give something to help them but the truth is that a bigger catastrophy is happening in Africa where thousands of children dies each day because of lack of food and clean water.

[denoir 0]

If you want to play that game Australia (760+M) is actually the largest donor  

Japan has actually pledged 500M (third), and the US is at 350M (fourth...plus there are already US ships and deliveries in the area).

It depends - if you sum up the EU states or not  

Actually, it's kind of interesting that they decided not to take it at a union level, but to delegate it to the member states to give as much as they feel they want and can. The commission is giving 'just' €30 M which they've said could be increased by 'tens of millions' i.e not hundreds of millions.

Either way, I think now logistics is more of a problem than money. I think that sending engineers (perhaps use the military for that) would be the reasonable next step - for rebuilding.

The Red Cross et al on the other hand are saying that money is still preferable to direct help as there are local resources that can handle it - and that it's better to let the money be invested in the local economies.

---

I don't know if it has been mentioned, today at noon a three minute silence was held across the EU to honor the victims. Traffic and everything stopped.

Three-minute silence for victims [bBC]

[Showtek 0]

why are some soldiers wearing guns while they removing the dead bodies of the street?