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Official:
After visiting a Tamil town in the northeast that was destroyed by
the tidal wave, Carol Bellamy, executive director of UNICEF, said
Monday that the TRO's "well-coordinated relief arrangements put
in place within so short a time are all really commendable."
Organization & TRO Volunteers
towards relief efforts,
assuring no
administrative and
overhead costs "
www. trousa.org
With the international relief effort well underway, aide
organizations are finding it difficult to get food, water and medical
supplies from the airport to the areas most affected by last
weeks tsunami. NPR's Jason Beaubien reports.
Rebuilding Begins [NPR Audio]
In northern Sri Lanka, tsunami survivors are going back to their
regular jobs, schools are reopening, and people are struggling
to resume normal lives. And there are efforts to begin rebuilding
towns and villages that were destroyed. NPR's Jason Beaubien
reports.
In the north of Sri Lanka, tens of thousands of tsunami survivors
are living in camps, grappling with losses and a jarring new way
of life. NPR's Jason Beaubien reports.
Sectarian tensions are complicating relief efforts in Sri Lanka, a
country trying to recover from two decades of civil war. NPR's
Madeleine Brand discusses the issues with Martin Regg Cohn,
Asia correspondent for the Toronto Star.
NPR's Jennifer Ludden visits a fund raiser in Bethesda, Md.,
where groups of professionals of Sri Lankan heritage make
plans to send aid to help tsunami victims. Their main concern is
for the people in the mostly Tamil northeast region of Sri Lanka,
where decades of civil war have left the residents weak and
malnourished.
For Sri Lanka the tsunamis aren't the first dealing with
devastation. The country is ethnically divided. A civil war has
been going on for the past twenty years in Sri Lanka. The
country, once called paradise on earth, has been divided into
two ethnic groups. Seventy percent of the population is
Sinhalese. The remaining thirty percent is Tamil. The Tamil
community lives mostly in the northeast part of the country.
RELIEF - NEWS ALERT
[Catholic World News]
The Catholic Bishop of Sri Lanka’s battered eastern province
has appealed for support for local humanitarian organizations
struggling to assist earthquake survivors.
Bishop Kingsley Swampillai of Trincomalee and Batticoloa said
that local services were more efficient than large international
groups in providing assistance to families in the region. He
reported that no government or international aid had reached
the area as yet, while donations of food and clothing were
pouring in from private individuals.
The bishop of Jaffna, the cultural capital of the Tamils, who are
mostly Christians or Hindus, also published an appeal to the U.N.
chief.
Senior U.N. officials said they regretted a visit to rebel-controlled
areas had become a political issue.
For its part, the United Nations did not want to push the Sri
Lankans on the issue, even though Annan's decision not to visit
could affect the U.N.'s smooth relations with the Tamil Tigers,
they said on condition of anonymity.
Like everyone else here, Anthony David has suffered the double
tragedy of war and the tsunami. "Yes I have been through the
war but this is worse," he says, "the army didn't kill everyone but
the sea has wiped everybody out."
Anthony David is part of a group of children in a welfare camp
being counselled by Catholic nun Sister Selvi.
"When I listen to them... I feel like crying," she says. "I also think
more than the war these waves have washed many people. This
is the worst thing that happened for our people."
Sister Selvi listens to small children recounting stories of dead
bodies in a matter of fact way.
Hundreds of Tamils gathered in Trafalgar Square on Saturday to
show solidarity, give thanks for British aid and highlight the plight
of tsunami survivors on Sri Lanka's north and east coasts.
Some who lost loved ones said they did not know whether they
were grieving for them, or for entire communities wiped out when
the waves hit on 26 December.
Some came because they felt it was their duty to remember
those who had died.
But they also wanted to draw attention to those who survived but
who, they say, are not getting their fair share of aid from the Sri
Lankan government.
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