Bangladesh death toll put at 5000

Press, 31 May 1985, Page 6

Bangladesh death toll put at 5000

NZPA-Reuter Dhaka Bangladesh, armed with pledges of international aid, put on a war footing yesterday its relief operation for hundreds of thousands of people made homeless by last Friday’s tidal wave.

Government and Red Cross officials lowered their estimates of the death toll from the wave, spawned by a cyclone, to around 5000. The Dhaka weather bureau said that the chances of a second cyclone hitting Bangladesh in the next few days had diminished.

The bureau, which gave a warning on Wednesday that a cyclone was approaching

the southern coast, said that the storm was dissipating. Friday’s tidal wave swept across seven islands in the Bay of Bengal and made more than 250,000 people homeless. A senior official at the Bangladesh Relief Ministry said that a national committee headed by the Navy chief, Rear-Admiral Sultan Ahmed, would conduct the relief work on a war footing. "Our first task is to organise drinking-water for the victims," said Abidur Rahman, the relief secretary. - Nearly a tonne of food

had already been sent to the area, clothes and utensils would follow in a couple of days. “Those who have survived will not be allowed to die. That is our motto,” he said. The Indian Prime Minister, Mr Rajiv Gandhi, was among the first international leaders to respond to Bangladesh’s plea for help, saying he would send helicopters, food and medicine if required. The American President. Mr Ronald Reagan, and the British Prime Minister. Mrs Margaret Thatcher, /have also sent promises of’ help to the President. Lieuten-

ant-General Hossain Muhammad Ershad, who has asked the world's rich nations for SUSSO million ($115.91 million) in aid. A Western diplomat in Dhaka said that officials of foreign aid agencies, who on Wednesday saw for the first time areas hit by the tidal wave, had said damage had been much less than some earlier reports suggested. "Some reports were simply figments of imagination," said the diplomat. The Red Cross had earlier said that 40.000 people might have been killed. But it said in a statement from Geneva on Wednesday that

it now had reports that only 5000 people died. In one community on Urirchar island. Red Cross volunteers had originally’ found only 3000 survivors from a population of 11,000, the statement said. Colonel Moshtaque Ahmed, of Dhaka's disaster relief centre, said that a survey had showed the island had a population of only 7000. He said that 2500 people had survived and 4093 were dead or missing. "I hope this sets at rest the controversy on those who died in the tragedy ” he said. Bangladesh has received aid pledges of SUSI.2

million ($2.78 million) from Japan, $U5525.000 ($1,216,962) from the United States, $U562,000 ($1,436,670) from Britain, $U5375,000 ($869,040) from the European Commission. $U5525,000 ($1,216,962) from the United Nations, and SUSIOO,OOO ($231,795) from the West German Red Cross. Five British-based charities also decided to join forces to help the victims by raising some SUS2.S million ($5.79 million). The Japan Red Cross said that it would send SUS2OO,OOO ($459,000) to b£y food and building materials.