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05 January 2005

High-Level Officials Meet in Jakarta on Tsunami Recovery Effort

Leaders to discuss relief and rebuilding, debt relief, warning system

Washington – High-level officials from more than 20 nations converge January 6 on Jakarta, Indonesia, for a one-day meeting to discuss relief and rebuilding for the nations stricken by the December 26, 2004, earthquake and tsunami. 

In the final day leading up to the meeting, donor nations raised their pledges for assistance to the region to more than $3 billion, according to published reports.

How best to spend that money, and coordinate the efforts of the many relief organizations who have quickly deployed to the affected nations, is a main agenda item at the Jakarta meeting, called by Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. His nation has suffered the most casualties from this natural disaster, with more than 94,000 deaths currently estimated. 

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies keeps the grim toll in this unprecedented humanitarian disaster and currently puts the number of dead at 150,000, injured at 525,000, and homeless at 1,000,000.

Leaders gathering in Jakarta will have three main issues before them:  coordination of the aid effort and rebuilding process; the possibility of debt relief or suspension of payments for affected nations; and construction of an early warning system that might allow sufficient time for evacuation if another giant wave rises out of the Indian Ocean in the future.

The United States and other Pacific nations have put such a system in place in that ocean, where tsunamis are more common.  At a Bangkok, Thailand, press briefing January 4 with U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, Thai Foreign Minister Surakiat Sathianthai appealed for U.S. technical expertise in establishing such a regional warning system, and Powell was quick to respond.

“[T]his is a matter that I’m very pleased to say that the United States will be working on with the countries in the region,” Powell said.

Powell, U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan, and prime ministers from Australia, China and Japan will be among the high-level officials attending the Jakarta meeting. 

Powell has been in the region since January 3 and has flown across tsunami-ravaged areas.  After flying over Indonesia’s hard-hit Sumatra island January 5, the secretary, a former military officer, said, “I have been in war and I have been through a number of hurricanes, tornados and other relief operations, but I have never seen anything like this.”

Even before the Jakarta meeting convened, the secretary of state pledged that the United States is committed to helping the region through its long-term recovery from tsunami-related damage.

For additional information go to “U.S. Response to Tsunami and Earthquake in Asia” at: http://usinfo.state.gov/sa/south_asia/tsunamis.html.

(Distributed by the Bureau of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)