News

Communities in Crisis across Asia-Oceania

Right across Asia-Oceania, typhoons, tsunamis and earthquakes may have left as many as several thousand people dead, and they certainly have left tens of thousands without shelter.

On Saturday, September 26, Typhoon Tetsana sliced through the Philippines causing extreme flooding in the capital and the surrounding provinces before heading on to Taiwan and Central Vietnam where drastic flooding also occurred.  Within a week Typhoon Parma followed a similar trajectory across northern Luzon, Philippines. With the floods many people have perished and thousands have been left homeless and grieving

Days later, on Tuesday, September 29, a shallow earthquake measuring 8.3 on the Richter scale triggered a tsunami that reached Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga within minutes. There was little time for warnings. Though only one thirtieth of the power of the 2004 earthquake that triggered the Boxing Day tsunami in the Indian Ocean and which in turn killed a quarter of a million people, the quake behind the recent Pacific tsunami has nevertheless brought considerable loss of life, injury and devastation to coastal regions in Tonga, American Samoa and Samoa. Many are homeless. Trauma abounds.

Meanwhile, Indonesia, the world’s fourth most populated country, has once again experienced a series of devastating earthquakes stretching from Sumatra in the West to Papua Barat in the East. The first of the quakes struck on Wednesday, September 30, causing large destruction in Padang and greater Sumatra. It is possible thousands have been killed, many having been buried by tremor-triggered land-slides.

On his way to Padang, a coastal city of 900,000 and the capital of West Sumatra, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono counselled, "Let's not underestimate (this disaster). Let's be prepared for the worst". His words now seem prophetic as the breadth of the disaster becomes known around the world.

But that is not all. India, the world’s second most populace nation, was also hit hard by raging floods on Monday, October 6. These floods are possibly the worst on record and certainly the worst for forty years.

Hundreds are lost and numerous villages remain totally isolated. Authorities estimate that anywhere from 1.5 million to 2.5 million people are displaced.

The irony of this severe flooding is that it comes hard on the heels of crippling drought across parts of India. Rural areas seem to have taken the brunt of the floods when the Krishna River burst its banks and covered much of Andra Pradesh and Kamataka.

While many communities are hanging on across the region, there is no doubt the ravages of nature have left them in crisis.

New Zealand and Australian Redemptorists remain prayerfully mindful of relatives in Samoa and Vietnam as well as our confreres across the Philippines, Indonesia, India and Vietnam. In solidarity with all the traumatised in the disaster zones we prayerfully reach out through Australian and New Zealand aid agencies. If you wish to make a contribution, you may do so either through the agencies listed below or through others of your choice.

Donations may be made through

• Caritas Aotearoa New Zealand
• Caritas Australia
• St. Vincent de Paul Society of New Zealand
• Vinnies Australia

God of nations, at thy feet in the bonds of love we meet, hear our voices, we entreat...