Survivors face hunger as Muslim festival nears

Hunger stalked some tsunami survivors in outlying villages of Indonesia yesterday as the death toll from the Indian Ocean disaster soared above 226,000.

Red Cross officials said some towns on Sumatra island had not received help and hundreds of bodies were still being recovered every day, nearly four weeks after the devastating tsunami that killed more than 166,000 in Indonesia alone.

"I think it's safe to say there are small pockets of communities that have not received international assistance as of yet," Langdon Greenhaugh, of the International Federation of Red Cross Red Crescent Societies, told a news conference in hard-hit Banda Aceh, capital of Aceh province on Sumatra's northern tip.

A top US military commander said US forces were preparing to wind down tsunami relief operations in the Indian Ocean but gave no definite timetable for a pullout.

In a seaside town on the coast of northern Sumatra island that lay directly in the path of the December 26 wave, prayers rang out for the first time since the disaster at sunrise from a mosque pockmarked with holes from the force of the wave.

Street stalls in Banda Aceh, capital of Aceh province on Sumatra's northern tip, bustled as shopkeepers sold pineapples, tomatoes, bright red chillis, purple scallions and sides of meat for a major Muslim festival today.

But many elsewhere in the region were not so fortunate.

American volunteer nurse Linley York said she had heard reports from an Indonesian working with her that people in a camp in the village of Beurawang to the north were eating leaves.

"There is definitely hunger here. If you are eating leaves, you are hungry," said York.

United Nations officials said emergency aid would have to be sharply increased to avoid hunger in outlying areas.

"The vast majority are receiving assistance," Greenhaugh said, and those who have not been reached yet would be "small pockets of hundreds of people rather than thousands".

If that hunger results in starvation and disease it could further swell the staggering death toll from the tsunami triggered by a magnitude 9 earthquake in the sea off Sumatra.

Indonesia's Health Ministry on Wednesday increased the nation's death toll to 166,320, adding tens of thousands of people previously listed as missing. The new figure lifted the total tsunami death toll to 226,566.

Hundreds of bodies were being recovered and buried every day.

The Indonesian foreign ministry said 92,721 bodies have been buried to date in Aceh, including 1,408 on Wednesday alone.

In Meulaboh, where up to one-third of the town's 120,000 people may have been killed, Indonesian flags fluttered from sticks and poles, marking spots where bodies remained buried under collapsed homes or piles of twisted wood and metal.

Indonesia's health ministry said 617,159 people were still homeless in northern Sumatra.

The jaw dropping death count came as Indonesia said it hoped to hold talks with rebels in Aceh, where the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) has waged a bloody, three-decade-long battle for independence from Jakarta's rule.

Political concerns have also plagued relief efforts in Sri Lanka, where the Tamil-rebel controlled northeast is waiting to see if it will get a piece of the government's $3.5 billion tsunami reconstruction programme.

"The tsunami didn't wash away political divisions. In fact it may have made them worse," said Jehan Perera, director of the National Peace Council in Sri Lanka.

"What we have here is a moment that will define the peace process and politics for years." (Reuters)Hunger stalked some tsunami survivors in outlying villages of Indonesia yesterday as the death toll from the Indian Ocean disaster soared above 226,000.

Red Cross officials said some towns on Sumatra island had not received help and hundreds of bodies were still being recovered every day, nearly four weeks after the devastating tsunami that killed more than 166,000 in Indonesia alone.

"I think it's safe to say there are small pockets of communities that have not received international assistance as of yet," Langdon Greenhaugh, of the International Federation of Red Cross Red Crescent Societies, told a news conference in hard-hit Banda Aceh, capital of Aceh province on Sumatra's northern tip.

A top US military commander said US forces were preparing to wind down tsunami relief operations in the Indian Ocean but gave no definite timetable for a pullout.

In a seaside town on the coast of northern Sumatra island that lay directly in the path of the December 26 wave, prayers rang out for the first time since the disaster at sunrise from a mosque pockmarked with holes from the force of the wave.

Street stalls in Banda Aceh, capital of Aceh province on Sumatra's northern tip, bustled as shopkeepers sold pineapples, tomatoes, bright red chillis, purple scallions and sides of meat for a major Muslim festival today.

But many elsewhere in the region were not so fortunate.

American volunteer nurse Linley York said she had heard reports from an Indonesian working with her that people in a camp in the village of Beurawang to the north were eating leaves.

"There is definitely hunger here. If you are eating leaves, you are hungry," said York.

United Nations officials said emergency aid would have to be sharply increased to avoid hunger in outlying areas.

"The vast majority are receiving assistance," Greenhaugh said, and those who have not been reached yet would be "small pockets of hundreds of people rather than thousands".

If that hunger results in starvation and disease it could further swell the staggering death toll from the tsunami triggered by a magnitude 9 earthquake in the sea off Sumatra.

Indonesia's Health Ministry on Wednesday increased the nation's death toll to 166,320, adding tens of thousands of people previously listed as missing. The new figure lifted the total tsunami death toll to 226,566.

Hundreds of bodies were being recovered and buried every day.

The Indonesian foreign ministry said 92,721 bodies have been buried to date in Aceh, including 1,408 on Wednesday alone.

In Meulaboh, where up to one-third of the town's 120,000 people may have been killed, Indonesian flags fluttered from sticks and poles, marking spots where bodies remained buried under collapsed homes or piles of twisted wood and metal.

Indonesia's health ministry said 617,159 people were still homeless in northern Sumatra.

The jaw dropping death count came as Indonesia said it hoped to hold talks with rebels in Aceh, where the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) has waged a bloody, three-decade-long battle for independence from Jakarta's rule.

Political concerns have also plagued relief efforts in Sri Lanka, where the Tamil-rebel controlled northeast is waiting to see if it will get a piece of the government's $3.5 billion tsunami reconstruction programme.

"The tsunami didn't wash away political divisions. In fact it may have made them worse," said Jehan Perera, director of the National Peace Council in Sri Lanka.

"What we have here is a moment that will define the peace process and politics for years."