Annan wonders where are the people?

US Secretary of State Colin Powell (R) shakes hands with a Sri Lankan tsunami victim during his visit to a Red Cross aid center at the coastal city of Galle yesterday. Powell has arrived in Sri Lanka for a day-long tour of the devastation caused by the December 26, 2004 tsunami that killed 30,600 people on the island. PHOTO: AFP

"I must admit I have never seen such utter destruction, mile after mile. You wonder, where are the people?," said Annan on his return to the provincial capital, Banda Aceh.

Meulaboh on the west coast of the island of Sumatra is just 93 miles from the epicenter of the undersea earthquake that sent a tsunami across Asia killing more the 153,000 people.

The United Nations estimated that one-third of Meulaboh's 120,000 people were killed when the giant waves ripped through the town on Dec. 26.

"I am deeply overwhelmed with the misery I just saw with my own eyes," said an emotional Tadao Chino, president of the Asian Development Bank who accompanied Annan, along with the leaders of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

But 12 days after the tsunami hit, and with aid merely trickling in to Meulaboh aboard US military helicopters, Annan said survivors were starting to rebuild their lives.

"We saw people beginning to pick up the pieces of their lives and that tells us something about the resilience of the human spirit," Annan told reporters at a brief news conference.

"They will need help for post-traumatic stress. They are going to need help to build their houses ... they are going to need help to build boats so they can go back to fishing."

The UN chief has called on world leaders to honor their pledges of nearly $5 billion, citing the failure of nations to fully deliver on promised aid after previous disasters, such as the earthquake which hit the Iranian city of Bam in late 2003.

Aceh province bore the full brunt of the tsunami, with 100,000 known dead or two-thirds of the victims across Asia, but the coastal area south of Meulaboh remains a black hole.

"We have no information at all below Meulaboh, it is a big worry," said Michael Elmquist, UN relief chief in Banda Aceh.

Satellite photographs of the area beyond Meulaboh on the west coast of Sumatra showed an "area that used to be land is now sea," Elmquist told Reuters.

There are at least 20,000 people around Meulaboh in desperate need of aid and, with outlying areas still cut off, the number of dead, injured and homeless will rise, the United Nations says.