Tsunami aid flights back on track

Aid flights resumed on Tuesday to a major hub of the international tsunami aid operation in Indonesia, after workers removed a supply plane that had hit a herd of cattle.

The crash of the Boeing 737 in the early morning caused no injuries but blocked aid flights for more than 17 hours. The airport reopened on Tuesday evening, an airport official said.

It was not immediately clear exactly how many flights were delayed. Helicopters were still able to use the airport.

The accident, however, illustrated the fragility of the infrastructure in the disaster zone, where wrecked roads and bridges are blocking the flow of badly needed relief supplies.

Indonesia is the worst-hit of all the nations affected by the December 26 disaster that killed an estimated 150 000 people around the Indian Ocean.

Its death toll was just more than 94 000 early on Tuesday but tens of thousands more are still missing and there is little hope of finding them alive. There are more than 300 000 refugees, government officials said.

Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong visited the region on Tuesday to assess the situation ahead of an international donor meeting on Thursday in Jakarta, an embassy spokesperson said.

Indonesia also announced that it will open a joint office with donor nations to address recovery efforts. The United Nations Development Programme will coordinate a six-month relief programme while the World Bank, Japan and the Asian Development Bank will coordinate a two-year rehabilitation programme.

“The joint office will coordinate all grants and loans designated for Aceh reconstruction,” said Anggito Abimanyu, a senior official at the Finance Ministry. “We hope most of the funds we will get for Aceh will be in the form of grants.”

United States military helicopters taking off from the USS Abraham Lincoln continued delivering aid to Sumatra in a massive relief operation and evacuated refugees from the hardest-hit areas.

On Tuesday, they began using SH-60 helicopters alongside the smaller Seahawk choppers that have for days been shuttling aid to Aceh.

Relief supplies, according to the government, have reached 80% of the coastal town of Meulaboh.

Seventy percent of the electricity has returned to Banda Aceh and eight banks have reopened, government officials said. Markets have resumed selling food and traffic is again filling the streets.

US marine Colonel Dave Kelley, chief of the US Support Group: Indonesia, from Sandis Field, Massachusetts, said a 15-member marine team has been assessing damage to find the best places to take aid.

“When we first arrived, the damage was so great that there didn’t need to be an assessment; there needed to be action,” he said, adding that the most urgent needs are hospitals and helicopters.

Indonesia also has 20 000 troops on Sumatra helping the aid effort and Australian troops are aiming to set up a field hospital in Banda Aceh in coming days.

International Organisation for Migration worker Kristin Badey said hospitals in downtown Banda Aceh are “overflowing”.

She said cases of pneumonia are being recorded among refugees — many of whom are stuck outside without shelter in Indonesia’s rainy season.

In Jakarta, preparations are under way for Thursday’s international donor conference, which will be attended by leaders and senior diplomats from around the world, including US Secretary of State Colin Powell, who is in the region viewing the devastation.

At the conference, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan will officially launch a UN aid appeal.

Governments and global organisations have already pledged $2-billion in tsunami disaster relief, according to the UN.

Up to 14 000 police are being deployed around the conference centre that will host the summit. The centre is linked to Jakarta’s Hilton hotel, part of a chain that Australia warned late last year could be targeted by terrorists over the Christmas period.

Participants also are expected to discuss ways to establish a multicountry Indian Ocean tsunami-warning system. Officials say an untold number of deaths could have been prevented if such a system — which exists in the Pacific Ocean — had been in place on December 26.

Blair under fire

Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Tony Blair absorbed more criticism on Tuesday for deciding not to interrupt his Egyptian holiday with his family following the tsunami disaster in Asia.

“I would have come back,” opposition Conservative Party leader Michael Howard said on Tuesday.

Charles Kennedy, leader of the Liberal Democrats, also has said that he would probably have rushed home if he had been prime minister.

Colleagues rallied to defend Blair, who returned to London on Monday.

“I think Mr Blair has been coordinating this from where he’s been,” Treasury chief Gordon Brown said. He told BBC radio that Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott had chaired daily meetings, involving key department heads including Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.

Straw said on Monday that Blair has been in constant touch with his office.

“The question for the British media and public is: is there a single thing the British government could and should have done that it has not done, notwithstanding the fact the prime minister is abroad? The answer is no,” Straw said. — Sapa-AP

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