Local ACT Members Respond to South Asia Disaster
Members of the global alliance Action by Churches Together (ACT) International in South and Southeast Asia are working hard to respond to the needs of survivors of Sunday's catastrophic disaster
Members of the global alliance Action by Churches Together (ACT) International in South and Southeast Asia are working hard to respond to the needs of survivors of Sunday's catastrophic disaster when an undersea earthquake triggered a series of tidal waves that swept across the region.
So far according to news reports, the massive 9.0 magnitude earthquake off the west coast of the northern Indonesian island of Sumatra and the resulting tidal waves have claimed the lives of more than 23,000 people in Sri Lanka, Indonesia, India, Thailand, Malaysia, Maldives and Bangladesh. Thousands of people are still missing and tens of thousands of people have been displaced. The full extent of the disaster is still not known in more remote areas in Sri Lanka, India and Indonesia, where ACT members are responding.
In Sri Lanka, where more than more than 12,500 people are said to have died, the National Council of Churches in Sri Lanka (NCCSL) reported that two truckloads of essential food items and water were to have left yesterday for Muttur in Trincomalee and the other to Thirukovil in Batticaloa, two of the worst hit areas.
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"The situation continues to be frightening," reported NCCSL emergency officer S.K. Xavier. "The security forces are dispatched in the affected areas to control the people, not allowing them to return to the risk areas, such as the shores. Though it was forecast that the monsoon rains have ceased, the weather has changed, and as a result, there is rain. Muttur is very badly hit, and it is a torrential rain there.”
Xavier added that "Thirukovil continues to be inaccessible and we hope to go up to Akkaraipattu and from there try some means to reach people."
Also of concern is that "in many cases there is a serious lack of medicines," Xavier said.
Compounding the disaster is the fact that in many of the worst hit areas hospital facilities are simply not adequate.
"Many people, on their own, have collected cooked food parcels to be distributed to those who have taken shelter in the Vihares (Buddhist temples), Kovils (Hindu temples), mosques and church halls. Some of them house families in thousands," reported Xavier.
According to ACT’s latest report, NCCSL has sent two teams to Batticaloa and Tricomalee to assess the needs of survivors. "Most of the year-end functions arranged by churches have been cancelled, with money collected being channeled to relief work," said Xavier. “Right now, all the churches have got their own teams helping with relief work."
Other relief operations by NCCSL and its local church members include transporting people displaced by the deluge to safe areas. Xavier said that in the east of the country "there are many children's homes run by the churches, and although we have been told that they have been moved to safe places, we have been unable to make contact with them." The homes support children who have lost their parents or families in the war.
NCCSL has also assisted people in the capital Colombo, by getting cooked food to those who survived. Traveling is also difficult, as many roads have been washed away, but NCCSL assessment teams report that they have managed to reach Kalutara at least, "although the roadway beyond Kalutara is affected. In Batti too, the toad to Thirukovil is almost fully damaged."
In India, ACT member Church's Auxiliary for Social Action (CASA) reports that 12 teams have been deployed, both assisting and assessing needs of people in the coastal areas. Four strategic operational points are being set up: two in Tamil Nadu at Trichy and Drinamvenny, one in Andhra Pradesh, and another one in Kerala to assist some 50,000 families. The official death toll in India so far is nearly 4,400 people.
CASA however reports that the churches in the coastal regions are reporting more deaths as news trickles in from smaller and more remote villages and areas. CASA has also started an emergency feeding program, as many people have sought sanctuary in churches and schools. Nine of CASA's member churches are already engaged in relief work following the disaster. Initial plans are that the emergency feeding programs will last three to five days.
In Tamil Nadu's Trichy region, CASA will be assisting people in Pondicherry, Karaikal, Nagapatnam and Caddalora. In Drinamvenny region, people in Buetiporan and Nagarkoil will receive assistance. Immediate relief assistance in all the locations targeted by CASA will comprise blankets, clothing, cooking equipment, candles and matches, and emergency shelter tarpaulins. Food items will include dhal, rice, spices and salt. Water tankers will be used to supply clean drinking water.
Other immediate relief operations will also include the removal of bodies, as well as animal carcasses. In the longer-term, 5,000 families will be assisted with house reconstruction programs, while 15 large cyclone/flood shelters (multi-purpose raised multi-story shelters commonly constructed around the Bay of Bengal) will be put up. Large stretches of land will have to be reclaimed and there will be a massive need for food-for-work programs to re-establish people's livelihoods.ods.
CASA reported to UK-based ACT member Christian Aid that cyclone shelters built during the 1990s have provided shelter to thousands of people who fled the tidal waves.
Earlier yesterday, in an update to the ACT Coordinating Office in Geneva, CASA said that staff had been in contact with the Bishop of the Anglican Church in the Andoman and Nicobar islands, and have sent just over $11,000 (USD) to provide emergency food to the communities there. No official figures of those killed and displaced are available, although fears are that people living on the two island chains may have suffered greatly. The Andoman and Nicobar Islands lie close to the fault line of Sunday's undersea earthquake.
ACT member United Evangelical Lutheran Church in India (UELCI) has also sent three teams to the hardest hit area and will be assisting people in Orissa, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu
In Indonesia, where more than 4,991 people are confirmed dead, ACT members Yayasan Tanggul Benkana (YTB), Yakkum Emergency Unit/CD Bethesda (YEU) and Church World Service (CWS) are coordinating their response to the emergency. CWS will conduct a rapid assessment mission to Aceh this week, working with a team from YEU. YTB reports that figures received from Aceh province puts those displaced at some 150,000 people. YEU will also be sending an assessment team to North Sumatra.
Indonesian Vice President Yusuf Kalla told the state news agency late Monday that he believed the toll in his country could climb to 25,000.
According to the Associated Press, the 500-mph waves triggered by Sunday's massive quake surged across the Indian Ocean and Bay of Bengal in the deadliest known tsunami since the one caused by the 1883 volcanic eruption at Krakatoa — located off Sumatra's southern tip — which killed an estimated 36,000 people.
