A senior United Nations official called Wednesday for a basic tsunami warning system to be established across the Indian Ocean region within a year, saying there was no technical or logistical reason the goal could not be met.
Salvano Briceno, director of the UN's International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, noted that a comparable system had operated in the Pacific for decades and could have saved many lives had a similar network existed around the Indian Ocean. The death toll from Sunday's disaster had surpassed 80,000 by Wednesday.
The catastrophe was set off by the most powerful earthquake in 40 years, which struck beneath the ocean near Indonesia. Seismologists worldwide detected the quake immediately, but no regional communications infrastructure existed to relay warnings to coastal populations.
Briceno said an initial Indian Ocean system could rely on straightforward information-sharing among neighboring governments, with more sophisticated technology to follow. "It's more a matter of political will and political priority," he told reporters.
US President George W. Bush separately urged the international community to develop a global alert network, noting that Sri Lankan President Chandrika Kumaratunga had raised the same need in recent discussions. The UN was already scheduled to convene a disaster-reduction conference in Kobe, Japan, the following month.
Historical summary. TurkishPress restated this AFP wire report, first published in December 2004, in its own words.