Thais Still Hope To Manage Early Warning System

[george]

Thailand still hopes for key role in regional tsunami warning system

BANDA ACEH: -- Thailand still hopes to play a key role in setting up a tsunami warning system despite a regional reluctance for it to become the hub, Foreign Minister Surakiart Sathiratha said on Wednesday.

While cooperation is crucial between Indian Ocean nations hit by the Dec. 26 tsunami, Thailand will make a practical center, Surakiart said during a visit to the disaster-hit Indonesian city of Banda Aceh.

A regional meeting of affected countries last month rejected an offer by Thailand to host a warning network for the Indian Ocean, prompting Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to threaten to go it alone.

The meeting agreed to create an interlinked system of regional warning systems, instead of accepting Thailand's proposal to build a system for the entire Indian Ocean at the Bangkok-based Asian Disaster Preparedness Center.

But Surakiart said Thailand still wanted involvement in a "multi-node" warning system and was prepared to add its disaster center to a wider network.

Thailand has said the initial phase of its system could be up and running within two months and be completed by the middle of 2006, linking it with existing warning networks for the Pacific Ocean.

"I think we have to work together in the multi-nodalarrangement early warning system so there should be various nodes in Indonesia, in Thailand, in India, East Africa," he told reporters.

"But we feel the Asian Disaster Preparedness Center, which has 30 members already and is now an international organization, should have the readiness to start working.

"In reality, technologically speaking, it would be most effective if there are various centers linked together, working together."

The plan to establish a tsunami warning system aims to avoid a repeat of the catastrophe which claimed almost 300,000 lives in 11 countries around the Indian Ocean basin.

-- AFP 2005-02-09

[The_Moog]

I don't want to sound cynical (Thai visa forum, lair of cynics? - nay, nay!)

....but at this rate, and with all the red tape, this warning system is gonna take so freakin' long to set up, they'll be lucky to finish it before the Sun goes supernova and turns into a white dwarf - let alone in time for the next tidal wave.

Now, what are your bets for the death toll from Songkran this year. 1000+ ?

[ovenman]

I don't want to sound cynical (Thai visa forum, lair of cynics? - nay, nay!)

Well, here's another cynic heard from: what do you all suppose the real deal is with pushing so hard for yet another Thai hub with this early warning system? Is it just a prestige/face thing for the Thais? Is there some way that Shin Corporation or one its many cronies will profit from this? Or what?