Jan 4 (TN) The Liberation Tigers‚ warned Monday that the recent heavy flooding in the Amparai district has exacerbated the risk of disease by dislodging bodies of victims of the Asian tsunami disaster. more..

Jan 4 (TN) Italian Foreign Ministry Tuesday handed over a consignment of medical equipments, medicines and tents for temporary shelters to Mr. S. P. Thamilchelvan to be distributed through the rescue and relief mechanism that have been set up in Tamil areas. more..

Jan 4 (TN) The Economic Consultancy House (TECH), a Non Governmental Organization that promotes socio-economic and technological development, and registered with the Government of Srilanka, has issued a project plan costing nearly Rs2 billion, to assist the more than 5700 fishing families in Mullaitivu district more..

Jan 4 (TN) Resettling the dislocated families from Vadamaradchchi coastal villages in Jaffna district due to Tsunami disaster has commenced Monday night. Displaced residents of coastal villages located between Katkovalam and Thondamannaru in Vadamaradchchi north division are being transported from the present welfare centres to the selected thirteen schools and places of worships close to their previous residences, more..

Jan 4 (LBO) Eight days after panic evacuation of tourists from Sri Lanka, travel agents and tour operators are cautiously looking at the possibility of re-selling the island. “Two large tour operators, from the UK and Germany are scheduled to visit on an inspection tour from January 7 to the 12,” more..

Jan 4 (SLA) Chief of Defence Staff Vice Admiral Daya Sandagiri and Commander of the Army Lieutenant General Shantha Kottegoda were in Jaffna during the weekend in order to take stock of gravity of the tsunami disaster in the peninsula and ensure speedy remedial measures. more..

Jan 4 (SLA) Coordination of all Relief Duties, Security, Welfare and Medical facilities to over 720,572 internally displaced tsunami victims now sheltered in 653 Social Welfare Centers around the country have been vested in the Army, Navy and Air Force effective from 03 January 2005. more..

Jan 4 (IPS) Mohamad Nawaz's eyes brim with tears as he stares at the wreck that was once his four-roomed home a short walk from the beach of this fishing village on the southern tip of Sri Lanka. What was once his furniture is scattered nearby. A damp stench hangs in the air. more..

Jan 4 (Reuters) Christian Aid’s Asia specialist, Anjali Kwatra, is part of a Christian Aid emergency assessment team in Batticaloa, eastern Sri Lanka. Here is her eyewitness account. We spent the day in the village of Dutchbar three miles away from our base in Batticaloa, on the east coast of Sri Lanka. more..

Jan 4 (AFP) Sri Lanka was facing a foreign exchange crisis when tsunamis caused massive loss of life, but analysts say spontaneous international aid may have saved the country from a bigger economic calamity. more..

Jan 4 (CNN) Aid is filtering through to parts of Sri Lanka, but thousands of people are still desperate for food and medical supplies, as many areas have not been reached by relief workers, CNN's Paula Hancocks reports. Hancocks talked to CNN Anchor Wolf Blitzer about the situation in Sri Lanka. more..

Jan 4 (GU) We spent the day in the village of Mavadicheanai, on the east coast of Sri Lanka. Conditions here are grim - worse than anywhere else we've been. This is a Tamil area and the people here have experienced around 20 years of civil war between the government and Tamil Tiger soldiers. more..

Jan 4 (LBO) Questions are now being asked about who knew what and when about the tsunami and who did or did not do what and when. Researchers who are constructing a timeline of the event, are uncovering a curious picture of complacent inaction which went on, not for minutes, but hours after the first waves reached the country. more..

Jan 4 (AP) Marijuana smoke wafted through the Blue Fox restaurant on a seaside strip of low-budget hotels and surf shops, a reminder that a few foreign tourists were still around after all the devastation wrought by the tsunami a week ago. more..

Jan 4 (IHT) John Keells Holdings, Jetwing Hotels and other Sri Lanka hoteliers expect a revival in travel to the island, which thousands of visitors fled after an earthquake triggered giant waves that devastated the coast. more..

Jan 4 (LBO) The government is looking at setting up temporary shelters for displaced families before the new school year begins, to free up occupied schools. “The Minister of Agriculture, Anura Kumara Dissanayake has instructed government agents to identify suitable State land to house displaced persons, instead of using schools as camps,” more..

Jan 4 (LBO) World Bank's President James D Wolfesnsohn is due in Sri Lanka in the coming days as part of its tour to countries hit by tidal waves and participate in the ASEAN tsunami donor conference on Thursday. more..

Jan 4 (Yahoo) Two Sri Lankan fisherman drag their small fishing boat as cross tsunami hit high way in southern Sri Lanka fishing village Paraliya January 4, 2005. An army of aid workers raced on Tuesday to supply food and water more..

Jan 4 (UT) The United Nations is offering to help coordinate tsunami relief shipments to Sri Lanka amid reports of logjams at the capital's airport and bickering between the Sri Lankan government and separatist rebels over delivery of aid. more..

Jan 4 (AFP) US helicopters began flying in Sri Lanka as part of a military operation to boost the island's tsunami relief work, officials said. Two Black Hawk aircraft were seen flying near the international airport outside Colombo as dozens of US marines arrived on the island, the officials said. more..

Jan 4 (HT) A top Sri Lankan government relief official has said that the LTTE's loud and persistent complaint that no government relief material is reaching areas controlled by it is only a clever ploy to collect money for its own coffers from gullible Tamils living abroad. more..

Jan 4 (HT) The Indian naval ship 'Godavari' has landed 200 metric tonnes of relief material and 30 tonnes of drinking water in Trincomalee in eastern Sri Lanka, parts of which were badly affected by the tsunami of December 26. more..

Jan 4 (Yahoo) Red Cross workers receive supplies from a US Blackhawk helicopter outside the Galle Fort in the southwestern coastal town of Galle. Heavy rains slowed relief operations in Sri Lanka's worst affected region more..

Jan 4 (AP) Relief workers were battling uninterrupted rain but continued aid work in eastern Sri Lanka's tsunami-hit areas, officials said Tuesday. Two thousand people were evacuated in the east last Saturday when temporary camps housing the displaced were inundated with rain water, briefly halting relief work. more..

Jan 4 (AP) The five crew members of the fishing boat Lakmadu barely felt the impact of the tsunami that devastated the Sri Lankan coastline because they were 750 kilometers (465 miles) out to sea. more..

Jan 4 (AP) American and Indian troops engaged in relief efforts for Sri Lanka might use the operation as a cover to spy on Tamil Tiger rebels, handing over intelligence to the government to help it fight the insurgents, a rebel-backed politician charged Tuesday. more..

Jan 4 (AP) Sri Lanka's teachers are doing something not found in their job descriptions. Dozens are looking for sturdy, shady trees to set up outdoor classrooms. After tsunamis has killed about 30,000 Sri Lankans on December 26, officials and UNICEF workers were trying to get surviving children back to school. more..

Jan 5 (ANN) They were sitting together for a Quran recital when the huge waves swept them away – all 25 of them. Nine days have since passed with not a trace of the children, all aged seven and eight who were attending religious class at Kanniya village in Trincomalee. more..

Jan 5 (ANN) Packed with food items, clothes, and plenty of good intention, an average of 10 lorries and vans would lumber up the winding mountain path to the Weharagala Rajamala Viharaya temple each day, offering aid to tsunami victims sheltering at a makeshift refugee camp there. more..

Jan 5 (AP) A Sri Lankan hospital only metres from the sea was saved from last week’s lethal tsunami by a single concrete wall, its medical director said today. Trincomalee General Hospital stands at one end of Dutch Bay, facing the Bay of Bengal from where the colossal waves came. more..

Jan 5 (HT) The Sri Lankan President, Chandrika Kumaratunga, on Monday gratefully acknowledged that India was the first to rush aid when her government sent out an urgent appeal for help in the wake of the massive tsunami onslaught on her country on December 26. more..

Jan 5 (TN) "The LTTE with its quick deployment ability and the Tamils Rehabilitation Organisation (TRO) with generous assistance from the Tamil Diaspora and the international NGOs, are tackling the immediate Tsunami relief needs, the first phase of the relief efforts. more..

Jan 5 (TN) Sri Lanka's official death toll aftermath of the tsunami disaster today rose to 30,229 with over 3,500 people still missing, amidst pouring international relief and rescue assistance in terms of man and materials. According to the Social Services Ministry statistics, Amparai district was the worst hit area with 10436 deaths. more..

Jan 5 (TOI) The tsunami has made a serious dent in the $73.3-billion Sri Lankan economy. Apart from the obvious casualty — the tourism and marine industries — it is now coming to light that the island-nation's garment and textile, and construction sectors, have been badly hit. more..

Jan 5 (AT) The newspapers are full of stories about sexual abuse of some girls who were Tsunami victims, by various unscrupulous elements who have infiltrate the refugee camps. Though the National Child Protection Authority has said that such incidents are few and far between, some incidents of molestation and rape are reported to have taken place. more..

Jan 5 (AT) All the usual responses that follow in the wake of a global disaster are flooding the 12 Asian nations hit by the tsunami on Boxing Day. Ships, helicopters, and planes are rushing into the region. The reporters of BBC, CNN, ABC (Australia) are swarming like locusts. more..

Jan 5 (AT) Sri Lanka’s President Chandrika Kumaratunga briefed Carol Bellamy UNICEF's Executive Director and the Resident Representative Ted Chaiban about the programme now in place to protect children made destitute by the catastrophe. more..

Jan 5 (AT) The People’s Rehabilitation Organization (PRO), recently set up by the liberal democratic Tamils in Norway has launched a countrywide campaign to collect donations for the people affected by Tsunami disaster in Sri Lanka. more..

Jan 5 (AT) It was Sunday morning and, in this deeply religious land, almost everyone was in church. But Gerard Perera was on the beach preparing for his day as a fisherman. "I saw the tide was coming inland," he said, "and I shouted. I ran to the church. My family was in the church, celebrating the Sunday Mass." more..

Jan 5 (AT) President of Sri Lanka has anounced the setting up of three Task Forces for Rescue and Relief –TAFRER, to Rebuild the Nation- TAFREN and for the Logistics and to ensure Law & Order – TAFLOL. The Treasury Secretary and the Foreign Secretary will handle matters relating finance and donations from overseas. more..

Jan 5 (Yahoo) Survivors : Two Sri Lankan young boys sit on an huge pile of donated clothes at a refugee camp set up in a Buddhist temple in the southwestern coastal town of Hikkaduwa. more..

Jan 5 (BBC) "Perhaps Hiroshima looked like this in 1945," Sam Klebanov told the BBC after seeing the devastation in the southern Sri Lankan town of Galle caused by the tsunami. Mr Klebanov and his friend Aleksandr Kamionsky are among several Russian-speaking tourists who turned into volunteers when disaster struck. more..

Jan 5 (BBC) Parliament sessions commenced with a minute's silence to remember those who lost there lives in the Tsunami disaster. The environment was sombre says journalist Daya Lankapura. The opposition requested a Parliamentary Select Committee to find out why an early warning on the deadly tidal wave was not made available. more..

Jan 5 (BBC) Armed servies will intervene and track down corrupt elements when and where necessary, army spokesman, Brigadier Daya Ratnayake said. It is dissapointing to hear that a handful of people are taking advantage of this situation and people should act with a sense of responsibility. more..

Jan 5 (BBC) The only two roads connecting the village of Pediyatala in eastern Sri Lanka to Amparai, the nearest big town, lie under eight feet of water. Inhabited entirely by Sri Lanka's Tamil minority, the village is flanked by a river on one side and a lagoon on the other. more..

Jan 5 (EI) United States marines led by Brigadier General Frank Pather who landed in Sri Lamka today are expected to take some of the heat out of the local aid distribution operations that have run into severe criticism. more..

Jan 5 (Stuff) Fishing boats that should be moored in the sea 400m away loom large from the roadside. A house lies on its side, surrounded by a lagoon that wasn't there a week ago. more..

Jan 5 (Stuff) A decision to watch a televised game of cricket between the Black Caps and Sri Lanka nearly cost a New Zealand man his life when the tsunami struck Sri Lanka on Boxing Day, his Southland-based sister-in-law said yesterday. more..

Jan 5 (Stuff) A Taranaki husband and wife are recovering in Kuwait after surviving a terrifying ordeal in Sri Lanka when it was hit by the Boxing Day tsunami. Pat Hounsell and Cushla Steffert were separated for more than a day after Pat became caught in a huge wave that swept him well inland from a beachside hotel, more..

Jan 5 (GU) The Tamil Tiger leadership has accused the Sri Lankan government of trying to make political propaganda out of the tsunami relief effort by exaggerating the amount of aid it is sending to Tamil-controlled areas. more..