Tsunami Warning: Why Didn't Scientists Notify the Press About the Impending Disaster?

The death toll of the Dec. 26th tsunami disaster continues to grow and now stands at 155,000 people killed across 11 countries. The World Health Organization estimates more than half a million people are injured and in need of medical care and fears are growing that diseases such as cholera and malaria would break out among the five million people left homeless.

Children are the biggest victims of the disaster, making up a third of the dead. U.N. officials said they are worried that thousands of orphaned or lost children might be falling prey to criminal gangs bent on selling them into slavery, adding to worries about a "tsunami generation" of children also under threat of disease and hunger.

Across Europe today, millions of people observed a three-minute silence to remember those killed. The German stock exchange stopped trading, cars remained motionless in the streets of Stockholm, mourners stood shoulder to shoulder in Paris and flags flew half-mast in the UK.

Meanwhile, Secretary of State Colin Powell traveled to Indonesia today where he took a two-hour helicopter tour of Aceh. The death toll there stands at nearly 100,000 people - two thirds of the total casualties. Powell told reporters "I have never seen anything like this."

After his tour of Aceh, Powell left for Indonesia's capital Jakarta where U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and other world leaders were arriving for a global relief summit on Thursday. Among issues to be discussed will be the implementation of a regional tsunami warning system. Thailand's top weather forecaster was fired for failing to issue a tsunami warning out of fear it could harm the tourism industry.

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/05/152213