Gunfire echoes through tsunami-hit city

Gunfire echoed through the main tsunami-hit city on Indonesia’s Sumatra island today, underscoring the threat to the scores of foreigners helping victims of the disaster that struck two weeks ago.

Indonesian authorities blamed separatist rebels for the incident near the UN compound in Banda Aceh, where relief workers have gathered to help survivors of the earthquake and tsunami that killed 150,000 people in Africa and Asia.

Hundreds of aid workers are pouring into the region with emergency assistance - and to help the stricken areas rebuild.

Violence in tsunami-ravaged Sri Lanka also revived security fears for aid workers there. Christians and Hindus clashed in the eastern part of the country where a massive aid effort is under way, killing at least three people and injuring 37.

Clashes between Hindus and Christians are rare since both groups belong the Tamil minority and believe they are oppressed by the country’s Buddhist Sinhalese majority.

No relief workers were injured in either incident. UN officials in Indonesia downplayed the shooting, which took place near the home of a deputy provincial police chief, saying there was no indication the gunfire targeted efforts to feed the disaster’s hungry and homeless.

“We don’t believe that aid workers are targets,” said Joel Boutroue, a UN relief official in Aceh. “We were told by guards that it was probably one person shooting a few rounds and that was it.”

Indonesian officials regularly blame Free Aceh Movement rebels for shootings and violence in Aceh, even if there is sometimes little evidence of their involvement.

The rebels have waged a separatist war in Aceh for nearly three decades. Thousands have been killed. There was an unofficial truce after last month’s disaster, which left more than 100,000 dead in the province, but a series of recent skirmishes have prompted Indonesia’s military to step up patrols for the guerrillas.

Adding to security concerns is the appearance of Laskar Mujahidin, an extremist group with alleged links to al-Qaida. The group, which has set up an aid camp, says it is there to help and won’t target foreigners, but its reassurances haven’t dampened concerns.

Despite the fears, a stream of relief workers kept pouring into the region.

The World Food Program is sending 170 staff. Other agencies have similar numbers.

The US military, which has hundreds of Marines, Navy personnel and troops on ships near Sumatra and in Sri Lanka, said aid workers must remain vigilant while working in restive areas.

“Security is a constant planning factor in all that we do,” US Army aid co-ordinator Maj. Nelson Chang said.

Refugee camps are being built on Sumatra to house and feed half a million homeless people, and bodies are still being pulled from the rubble and buried in mass graves.

Rain pounded relief workers today, turning Banda Aceh airport – the hub for aid supplies – into a muddy mess and soaking piles of cardboard boxes of aid sitting on the tarmac. Scores of tents where aid workers and soldiers camped had become a quagmire.

It’s the middle of the rainy season in Indonesia and the pounding downpours could further complicate a relief effort already hamstrung by damaged infrastructure, including roads and bridges washed away.

Two weeks after walls of water flattened wide swaths of coastline around the Indian Ocean, people were still emerging from isolated villages.

Staggered by the scale of the disaster, aid officials said they may have to feed as many as two million survivors a day for six months.

World leaders have been streaming into the region in an attempt to better assess the needs of tens of thousands of people.

World governments, led by Australia and Germany, have pledged nearly US 4 billion (£2.1 billion) in aid – the biggest relief package ever.

The United States has pledged US 350 million (£187 million), which US President George W. Bush called only an “initial commitment” and essentially a line of credit that can be spent as American relief officials identify needs.

Hundreds of people protested in Sri Lanka’s Tamil-dominated north today after UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan agreed to a government request not to visit tsunami-stricken areas under Tamil rebel control.

Annan said that he hoped it would not strain relations between the United Nations and the rebel group.

“I’m hoping to come back and be able to visit all areas of the country, not only those repaired, but also to celebrate peace,” he said. “The UN is not here to take sides.”