Great Sumatra-Andaman Earthquake.

national | environment | opinion/analysis

Wednesday December 26, 2007 16:56

by C Murray

Three Years ago Today

A member of my family was supposed to be on Phuket on the day of the Tsunami
but had been dragged away on holiday by his partner.He lost his friends and co-workers
and it took us a while to ensure he was indeed alive..

Today is the third anniversary of the Great Sumatra- Andaman Earthquake
and a lot of help is still needed, unfortunately the links to the Isis site are not working
so I cannot offer a Grassroot perspective of what has been achieved and what is
still needed.

Wiki Image of the Tsunami

We heard it on the radio and knew straight away that it was bad. There were 36 hours
of trying to get through and get information, we were finally contacted from Japan.

229,866 people died in Indonesia, in Aceh.
Somalia was effected.
Burma/Myanmar was effected..
The Maldives were effected.
Malaysia escaped a lot of it.
Indonesia was devastated.
Sri Lanka was effected.
The Maldives were effected.

The earthquake measure between 9.1 and 9.3, and was one of the biggest recorded
on a seismograph.

These a lot of mainstream commeroration today and Wiki on the Tsunami is
available at:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_Indian_Ocean_earthqua...dmass

There are appeals ongoing for aid and expertise mainly through the Red Cross.
An early warning system has been instigated and is operating.

Thanks to the people who got my brother home for a family funeral and
condolences to those who lost family at that terrible time. I decided not to
publish images of the commeroration. There are many civil society and NGO's
who report the recovery and aid situation without a media bias and will add in the links
over the next day or two.

The search engine at http://www.isiswomen.org has portals into the NGO and
Grassroot activity in the re-building effort.

Sumatra
Sumatra

Epicentre

Madonna of the Two Flames

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Comments (6 of 6)

IMC Jakarta

Sun Jan 27, 2008 12:36

http://jakarta.indymedia.org/index.php

(anti-globalisation section and focus on EU Immigration Policy, a special report on Bali
including links to Civil Society Protest groups who were disallowed access to the Climate Change Conference
A large part of the site is written in english, especially the features page, which runs down the centre column).

http://www.jakartass.blogspot.com

(a jakartan speaking of Suharto and fiscal corruption)

Blog on Suharto

Sun Jan 27, 2008 11:57

amazing how the corrupt are always facilitated by the media and the West, who 'tut' after
the deaths. All mainstream from NY Times to Independent to I.T are discussing how
he was disgraced and villified- but not one of them has looked in any depth into
the eco disaster that Indonesia has become. I hear reports of huge forest fires and
human rights abuses from friends on a regular basis- it does not get past local news
unless its a big f***ing earthquake.

http://jakartass.blogspot.com

Suharto- a 'Friend of the West and anti-communist'

Suharto is dead

by Obit.

Sun Jan 27, 2008 11:41

Suharto who stood accused of corruption, massacre and eco destruction, was
always seen 'as a friend of the West'- he lasted 32 years and the catalogue of
abuse is still being collated. though its easy enough to meet and talk to Indonesians
in Ireland who have come here to escape the result of Suharto's Policy.

Its all over the mainstream, very little however on the 2000 agreements between
three globalised economies on the future (ecological and sustainable) of the
Andaman Islands which are under threat because of a 1,400 K roadway
(superhighway) being built through these lands which India had 'preserved'-

The tribes were also relocated and suffered illness and death as a result of Government
policy in the area.

The three economies that are interested in developing the highway are Burma-Myanmar,
India and China.

32 year reign of Suharto coming to an end

by C

Sun Jan 13, 2008 15:12

Thousands died, there is a corruption case embrogolio outside the private room where
a 'friend of the west' and avowed anti-communist lies dying.

Mainstream media coverage via Reuters and CNN.

Maybe someday my friends who escaped the regime will be able to go back with
their kids, though huge eco disaster, (forest fires and corruption) make it
unattractive.

The president of Indonesia is dying today, the doctors have him on a ventilator with
instructions not to recussitate because of multiple organ failure.

Thousands may have survived the catastrophe at Aceh if a dictator supported by 'foreign
interests'' had not so sucessfully hampered information sharing and freedom of
speech, if distrust of help had not hampered rescue attempts.. cf 'Red Cross' reports
in first comment.

IMC's

Wed Dec 26, 2007 17:33

Japan, Manila, Jakarta have operating iMC's and civil society horizontal publication fora, which includes
the use of AMARC and Radio amongst protest groups- many stories from London and NYC make it to
Jakarta which operates on Oscailt V 204.
The coverage of the Bali Climate Conference is on Jakarta IMC along with links to cSO forum:-

http://english.csoforum.net
http://www.isiswomen.org

There is no translation button but some of the international reports including the Brad Will coverage is in
English.

http://www.indymedia.org includes a list along the lefthand column to the global sites.

There were mud slides in indonesia today with 66 reported deaths.Every year there are huge toxic forest fires which
barely make it to the international media and the situation regarding violence is also largely ignored.
For the last two weeks there has been curfew and agigtation in Kuala Lumpar with Indian citizens
marching on the British sites to oppose the history of British Colonisation with street fighting and arrests of protestors.
Other information that does not come through is the problem with regard to Timor-Leste where many western journos
do not go and the humanitarian situation is appalling over there, when it flares up the people can identify the
planes and their nationalities which overfly the region.

The civil society groups have been agigtating for change and were largely not allowed to attend the Bali
conference this year, IFEX/AMARC and ISIS have developed international links to increase awareness of
problems in the Pacific Area , they work incredibly closely with the UN and the EFF but their work is wholly
ignored by representaives of commercial media.

Red Cross Reports

Wed Dec 26, 2007 17:05

http://www.ifrc.org/docs/pubs/idrl/tsunami_factsheet.pdf
http://www.ifrc.org/docs/pubs/idrl/idrl-indonesia.pdf

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Great Sumatra-Andaman Earthquake.

Comments (6 of 6)