Tsunami aid faces chaos and possibly pirates<\/p>\n
Michael Perry, Reuters\/Bangkok<\/p>\n
The massive Asian tsunami relief operation faces absolute chaos
\nand \"a wall of devastation\" in Indonesia as well as the threat of
\npirates plundering aid, relief groups struggling to help
\nthousands in camps said on Monday.<\/p>\n
As aid logjams began to ease at Asian airports, bursting with
\nhundreds of tonnes of emergency supplies, it was the destruction
\nleft by nature that was proving the biggest obstacle to the US$2
\nbillion relief operation, the biggest since World War II.<\/p>\n
\"It's absolute chaos,\" said Titon Mitra of CARE International,
\nwhich is running 14 survivor camps in Indonesia's Aceh province.
\nAbout two thirds of the 144,000 people killed by the Dec. 26
\nIndian Ocean tsunami died there.<\/p>\n
Washed-out roads, broken bridges and widespread flooding meant
\nswathes of Sri Lanka's eastern seaboard and Aceh's west coast
\nremained inaccessible eight days after the tsunami hit.<\/p>\n
Aid workers fear some isolated survivors may not be reached
\nfor weeks, despite a fleet of military helicopters dropping aid.<\/p>\n
\"The emergency teams are arriving to be blocked by a wall of
\ndevastation. Everything is destroyed,\" Aly-Khan Rajani, CARE
\nCanada's program manager for Southeast Asia, said in Jakarta.<\/p>\n
The tsunami relief operation has seen an outpouring of aid.
\nThe World Bank said it could double or triple the $250 million it
\nhas already promised.<\/p>\n
\"The world is really coming together here in a way that we
\nprobably have never seen before,\" U.N. Emergency Relief
\nCoordinator Jan Egeland said in New York.<\/p>\n
Military forces have swung into rescue mode, with ships,
\naircraft, and thousands of troops, especially medical
\nspecialists, deployed from the United States, Australia,
\nMalaysia, Singapore, Germany, India, Pakistan, China and Japan.<\/p>\n
The United States alone has sent 12,000 personnel, mainly in a
\n12-ship naval fleet, but the United Nations said it expects to
\ncall for more military aid.<\/p>\n
The UN Joint Logistics Center, setting up operations in
\nJakarta, said the request was likely to include a call for
\nhelicopter carriers for Indonesia, Sri Lanka and the Maldives.<\/p>\n
It would also need 5 air traffic control units, fixed wing
\naircraft capable of short take-off and landing, 100 boats or
\nlanding craft and large cargo aircraft, and fuel storage units.<\/p>\n
Australia was sending small Iroquois helicopters for landing
\nin the worst-hit areas.<\/p>\n
Some 1,500 U.S. marines were due to land in Sri Lanka.<\/p>\n
Singapore said a landing craft with 400 military personnel and
\nheavy equipment had landed at Meulaboh, a city on the devastated
\nwest coast of Aceh where it is feared one third of the
\npopulation, as many as 40,000 people, may have perished.<\/p>\n
An Australian field hospital was being flown to Aceh and an
\namphibious ship with 100 engineers was steaming there to help in
\nreconstruction.<\/p>\n
The UN says 1.8 million tsunami victims need food. Hundreds of
\nthousands are homeless. Clean water is vital to prevent diseases
\nwhich could kill tens of thousands of survivors.<\/p>\n
The UN children's agency UNICEF said it had begun a measles
\nand vitamin A immunization program for up to 100,000 children in
\nIndia's hard-hit Tamil Nadu and Kerala regions.<\/p>\n
\"Measles is a deadly threat to children living in crowded
\ncamps,\" said Dr. Marzio Babille, UNICEF's chief of health in
\nIndia. \"It spreads quickly, killing children, or severely weakens
\ntheir immune systems.\"<\/p>\n
\"Those children are then too weak to fight off other diseases,
\nleading to more deaths. It's a vicious circle.\"<\/p>\n
Aid agencies said there was an urgent need to supply people
\nwith the means to rebuild their own lives.<\/p>\n
\"If we just feed them today, what happens to them tomorrow?\",
\nasked CARE's Rajani. \"The immediate needs are food, water and
\nshelter, but in the weeks and months to come, we are going to
\nhave to help the survivors rebuild their communities.\"<\/p>\n
UNICEF said it sought to raise $81 million to help an
\nestimated 1.5 million children affected by the tsunami in Asia,
\nmany now orphans.<\/p>\n
One third of the dead are believed to be children, too small
\nor weak to survive the giant walls of water, it said.<\/p>\n
UNICEF said there was an urgent need to normalize the lives of
\nchildren who had seen so much death and destruction and it was
\ntrying to reunite them with families and to re-open schools.<\/p>\n
\"The simple process of attending school is a key step in
\nreturning a sense of normalcy to the lives of children affected
\nby emergencies,\" it said.<\/p>",
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