International Community Joins Bangladesh Cyclone Relief Efforts

Text of report by staff correspondent headlined “Int’l community joins relief efforts” published by Bangladeshi newspaper New Age website on 18 November

A number of world bodies, development partners, and aid agencies have offered assistance to support the victims of cyclone Sidr.

The UN under-secretary general for humanitarian affairs, John Holmes, has said in New York that his office would make available “several million dollars” in emergency aid.

Germany has allocated 293,000 dollars in emergency relief aid and the European Union has released 1.5m euros, or 2.1m dollars, in fast- track aid.

Volunteers from international aid agencies, including the UN World Food Programme, Save the Children, and the US-based Christian aid group World Vision, have already joined the relief efforts.

The UN will offer more assistance to support the cyclone victims, given the availability of information regarding the damages, said a UN news release issued on Saturday [17 November].

The UN resident coordinator, Renata Dessallien, said the government’s preparatory efforts and use of early warning systems had played a significant role in minimising the loss of life.

The UN agencies in coordination with central and local authorities carrying out humanitarian relief work have already been engaged in distributing food, water purification tablets, jerry cans and other non-food items.

A team from the United Nations’ Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs arrived in Bangladesh on Saturday to assist the cyclone victims.

The UN system had made ready relief items and sent assessment teams to its sub-office in Jessore. Accordingly, the first relief packages of food were distributed among the victims on Friday, the day after the cyclone had hit the country’s south and south-western regions, said the news release.

“As immediate assistance, the UN is distributing 208 tonnes of high-energy biscuits (to feed 850,000 persons), and providing 240,000 water purification tablets, medicines and medical equipment, and other essential goods,” it said.

World Vision is putting together seven-day relief packages for families. The relief items include rice, oil, sugar, salt, candles, and blankets, according to Vince Edwards, the agency’s Bangladesh director.

“Our relief teams have started emergency distribution, with an initial coverage of 100,000 people,” Edwards said.

CARE has dispatched emergency teams with equipment and supplies to provide immediate relief to the Sidr-ravaged coastal cities. It has sent five mobile water purification plants, each capable of producing 10,000 litres of fresh drinking water a day, to Khulna. In addition, CARE already began delivering emergency food rations, plastic sheets, candles, and plastic water containers to 5,000 families, after the storm had passed.

The European Commission has announced a 1.5m euros fast-track aid for the cyclone victims. Expressing his sympathy with the victims, the European Commissioner for development and humanitarian aid, Louis Michel, said: ‘This is a major tragedy with hundreds already known to have died and hundreds of thousands suffering from this disaster. Homes, crops and livelihoods have been destroyed and people need help quickly. The fast-track funding that we are deploying will focus on meeting basic humanitarian needs in the stricken area.’

Experts from the European Commission’s Humanitarian Aid department were sent from Dhaka to the affected regions. Their initial reports underline that the immediate needs are for food, safe drinking water, temporary shelters, and basic household items, including blankets, jerri cans, clothes, and kitchen sets.

The United States also has expressed its deepest sympathy for the cyclone victims as it joined hands with the international community in relief efforts.

“We are ready to work with the government [of Bangladesh] and foreign donors to assist in relieving the effects of the disaster,” US State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said, reading a statement to reporters in Washington.

Two US Navy amphibious assault ships are on their way to Bangladesh after cyclone Sidr slammed into the country’s coastal belts, killing at least 1,100 people and making thousands more homeless.

The UK minister for Asia at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Lord Malloch Brown, in a message to the foreign affairs adviser, Iftekher Ahmed Chowdhury, on Friday said, “as friends of Bangladesh and its people we share your determination to rebuild communities. Our ties are deep. We’ve offered our immediate support to relief efforts through the UN and stand ready to provide more assistance, as and when required.”

Originally published by New Age website, Dhaka, in English 18 Nov 07.

(c) 2007 BBC Monitoring South Asia. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.