Aceh silence begins emotional tsunami ceremony

Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, center, and his wife Kristiani, second right, sprinkle flowers during their visit to a mass grave of tsunami victims in Lhok Nga on the outskirts of Banda Aceh, Indonesia, yesterday. PHOTO: AP

Tearful from around the world gathered yesterday to light candles and offer prayers on the anniversary of the Indian Ocean tsunami, one of the deadliest natural disasters ever.

From Indonesia to Sri Lanka, on beaches, at mosques and in churches, survivors and relatives remembered the more than 220,000 people killed when the waves slammed into a dozen countries exactly one year ago yesterday.

The day's solemn commemorations began in Indonesia, where President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono led an emotional ceremony with a minute's silence to remember the 168,000 people killed in Aceh, which bore the brunt of the disaster.

"Let us now bow our heads in silence to pray for the souls of hundreds of thousands who lost their lives," he said.

"May they rest in peace by God's sight," he said, sounding a wailing siren that forms part of an early warning system being set up to prevent a repeat of the tragedy. No such mechanism was in place when the waves struck last year.

The catastrophe brought grief into lives of people across the globe, killing locals and foreigners, the young and the old, with many of the victims simply washed away, leaving their desperate relatives hoping against all hope.

"I've announced their names and had their photographs printed in newspapers and shown on television but there is no news about them," Tuti Suyanti, 32, said of the two children and 10 other family members she lost.

"Somehow I still hold out hope that I will find them but I leave everything in the hands of God," she said.

In the Indonesian town of Padang, officials tested the warning system for the first time yesterday, with emergency personnel evacuating residents amid efforts to prevent a similar tragedy from ever happening again.

"It was so brutal, so quick, so extensive that we are still struggling to fully comprehend it," UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a video message broadcast at the Aceh ceremony.

"A year on, there has been tremendous progress in many areas ... And yet in some ways, the most challenging days lie ahead," he said.

Some million people across the region were left homeless by the disaster, and hundreds of thousands of them are still living in tents or temporary shelters.

A massive undersea earthquake off the Indonesian island of Sumatra triggered the giant waves, which hit as far west as Africa, and pounded shorelines in Asia with ferocious speed and power.

In southern Thailand, where some 5,400 Thais and foreign holidaymakers were killed, mourners signed books of remembrance or tossed flowers into the sea as they gathered along the battered beaches where their loved ones died.

Swedish Mari Olsson and Michael Sanden came back with their two surviving daughters to honour the memory of a third who was killed when the entire family was caught up in the giant waves.

"We didn't want to be home at Christmas. We didn't want to celebrate," Olsson said.

also see stories:
Tsunami anniversary: Yudhoyono mourns with Aceh victims
Tsunami anniversary: Tears flow on Thailand's beaches
Tsunami anniversary: Indians remember those lost with prayers and vigils
Tsunami Sri Lankans gather where a train was swept away