THAILAND: THAI GOVERNMENT SAYS PROBLEM OF DECOMPOSING BODIES OF TSUNAMI VICTIMS HAS TO BE RESOLVED TO AVOID HEALTH RISKS DESPITE LACK OF IDENTIFICATION
Record ID:
576913
THAILAND: THAI GOVERNMENT SAYS PROBLEM OF DECOMPOSING BODIES OF TSUNAMI VICTIMS HAS TO BE RESOLVED TO AVOID HEALTH RISKS DESPITE LACK OF IDENTIFICATION
- Title: THAILAND: THAI GOVERNMENT SAYS PROBLEM OF DECOMPOSING BODIES OF TSUNAMI VICTIMS HAS TO BE RESOLVED TO AVOID HEALTH RISKS DESPITE LACK OF IDENTIFICATION
- Date: 30th December 2004
- Summary: (EU) KHAO LAK, THAILAND (DECEMBER 30, 2004) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 1. WIDE OF EXTERIOR OF WAT YAN YAO TEMPLE WHERE CORPSES ARE LAID OUT 0.05 2. SLV DRY ICE VAN ARRIVING OUTSIDE TEMPLE 0.09 3. VARIOUS OF VOLUNTEERS CARRYING ICE BLOCKS FROM TRUCK 0.22 4. WIDE OF VOLUNTEERS CARRYING BLOCKS OF ICE TO THE WRAPPED AND SOME BLOATED BODIES 0.28 5. CLOSE OF BLOCKS OF ICE ON THE GROUND 0.33 6. WIDE OF CANOPY IN FRONT OF REFRIGERATED CONTAINER FOR THE BODIES 0.40 7. WIDE OF AUSTRALIAN FORENSIC WORKER TAGGING CORPSES INSIDE CONTAINER 0.42 8. SLV OFFICIALS CHECKING LISTS 0.47 9. WIDE OF CORPSES INSIDE BODY BAGS ON THE GROUND, MORE WORKERS LYING OUT BODY BAGS 0.53 (EU) PHUKET, THAILAND (DECEMBER 30, 2004) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 10. WIDE OF AUSTRALIAN AMBASSADOR TO THAILAND, BILL PATTERSON, TALKING TO JOURNALISTS 0.57 11. SCU (SOUNDBNITE) (English) AUSTRALIAN AMBASSADOR TO THAILAND, BILL PATTERSON, SAYING: "As I understand it, and I spoke to the Thai Minister for the Interior yesterday, the Thai government has a policy of not cremating the bodies of foreigners. There has been some cremation of Thai nationals but that's Thailand's business. But we've made it clear that we would prefer that bodies would not be cremated but there would be adequate time for preservation, identification and return of the remains." 1.26 12. WIDE OF VOLUNTEERS CARRYING BODIES IN BAGS 1.33 13. SLV AUSTRALIAN POLICE AND FORENSIC WORKERS WITH LISTS 1.39 14. WIDE OF VOLUNTEERS ZIPPING UP BODY BAGS 1.45 15. WIDE OF RESTING AREA FOR VOLUNTEERS 1.49 16. SLV KHUNYING PORNTHIP ROJANASUNAN, DEPUTY DIRECTORY OF THE CENTRAL INSTITUTE OF FORENSIC SCIENCE TALKING TO AUSTRALIAN FORENSICS 1.55 17. SCU (SOUNDBITE) (English) DEPUTY DIRECTORY OF THE CENTRAL INSTITUTE OF FORENSIC SCIENCE, KHUNYING PORNTHIP ROJANASUNAN, SAYING: "It has become very difficult because of the condition of the body shows severe decomposition and on the 4th and 5th day we have no, very little number of staff to take care of identification, almost all the doctors go back to Bangkok." 2.15 18. WIDE OF EXTERIOR CREMATORIUM 2.22 19. VARIOUS OF COFFIN OF TSUNAMI VICTIM BEING PUT INTO CREMATION CHAMBER 2.34 20. WIDE OF RELATIVES WITH MASKS LOOKING ON 2.40 21. VARIOUS OF RELATIVES MAKING OFFERINGS 2.55 23. CLOSE OF COFFIN INSIDE CREMATION CHAMBER 3.01 24. WIDE OF CREMATORIUM WITH CHIMNEY 3.08 25. CLOSE OF SMOKE COMING OUT OF CHIMNEY 3.15 26. WIDE OF MORE OF BODIES BEING MOVED IN BODY BAGS AT NIGHT 3.22 27. SLV BODY IN BODY BAG LYING IN DRY ICE (SMOKE ON THE GROUND) 3.27 28. SLV BODIES BEING CARRIED 3.32 29. SCU (SOUNDBITE) (English) THAI DEPUTY MINISTER OF HEALTH, SUCHAI CHAROENRATANAKUK, SAYING: "Actually the incident, the disaster, has occurred very fast so it's a lot of body that has been found, is going to be found, so it's like a war actually, it's like atomic bomb, so we have to have the resources to recover the bodies and many bodies have been drowning for some time, coming up to the surface of the sea." 4.03 30. VARIOUS OF BODIES IN BAGS AND TIED UP LYING ON THE GROUND 4.15 Initials Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved
- Embargoed: 14th January 2005 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: KHAO LAK AND PHUKET, THAILAND
- Country: Thailand
- Reuters ID: LVAANJ8NWGNPT7EUTIYF9VERXBF4
- Story Text: Thai government says problem of decomposing bodies
has to be resolved to avoid the risk of disease despite Western
calls for them to be left alone until they are identified.
Foreign forensic experts on Thursday (December 30)
joined the desperate race to identify Thailand's tsunami
victims as the death toll and the number of missing mount
and people give up hope of finding loved ones alive.
With much of Europe transfixed by a disaster that
killed hundreds of its tourists escaping a dark, cold
winter for the warmth of Thailand's Andaman Sea shores,
German, Swiss, Dutch, Australian and other forensic teams
started their gruesome task.
There were signs of fractiousness with Thais wanting to
bury bodies, decomposing fast in the tropical heat and
piling up quickly, and diplomats insisting no unidentified
body be buried.
Australian ambassador to Thailand, Bill Patterson, said
in the morning that the Thai government had agreed not to
cremate western bodies until they had been identified.
"As I understand it and I spoke to the Thai Minister
for the Interior yesterday, the Thai government has a
policy of not cremating the bodies of foreigners. There has
been some cremation of Thai nationals but that's Thailand's
business. But we've made it clear that we would prefer that
bodies would not be cremated but there would be adequate
time for preservation identification and return the
remains," Patterson said.
In Phuket, Thailand's Deputy Director of the Central
Institute of Forensic Science, Khunying Pornthip
Rojanasunan, who has already been highly critical of the
government's lack of adequate equipment to deal with the
bodies, said the situation was deteriorating fast.
"It has become very difficult because of the condition
of the body shows severe decomposition and on the 4th and
5th day we have no, very little number of staff to take
care of identification, almost all the doctors go back to
Bangkok," she said.
Although the diplomats won the argument, with Thai
Deputy Health Minister Suchai Charoenratanakul saying no
unidentified body would be buried, by evening he urged for
another course of action.
"Actually the incident, the disaster, has occurred very
fast so it's a lot of body that has been found, is going to
be found, so it's like a war actually, it's like atomic
bomb, so we have to have the resources to recover the
bodies and many bodies have been drowning for some time,
coming up to the surface of the sea," he said.
Some governments, especially Sweden, are under pressure
to find out just how many of their people were among the
6,130 Thailand said were still missing five days after the
wall of water struck.
Fulminating Swedish newspapers said as many as 4,000
Swedes could be missing as the official 1,500 figure seemed
to be based only on charter tours, without backpackers or
those on scheduled flights.
The death toll from the tsunami, triggered by a
magnitude 9.0 earthquake off Indonesia on Sunday (December
26), is more than 120,000 people.
In Thailand, the government said nearly 2,400 were
known to have died and 710 of them were foreigners.
Both numbers are expected to rise and experts fear some
of the badly decomposed bodies, many wearing only what they
had on when the tsunami stuck, may never be identified.
Local police say more than 1,800 bodies had been
recovered from Khao Lak, north of the resort island of
Phuket.
They believe as many as 3,000 people may have died
around Khao Lak when the wall of water swept up its gently
sloping beach -- which made it an ideal family holiday spot
with safe swimming for children.
It smashed into a line of luxury hotels and ploughed up
to 1 km (1,000 yards) inland from a beach particularly
popular among Scandinavians and Germans. About 1,000
Germans are unaccounted for and many of them, too, could be
among Thailand's missing.
Khao Lak is yielding at least 300 bodies a day, despite
a search and rescue operation officials admit is struggling
to cope in a country that rarely suffers natural disasters
worse than floods during the annual monsoon.
How long it will take to finish finding the missing and identify
the dead, nobody knows.
Most of the bodies are beyond recognition and survivors
searching for loved ones are faced with gruesome mosaics of
photographs at Buddhist temples used as a temporary morgue.
For some, there are no photographs, only hints -- a
watch, a ring, a mobile telephone.
An immediate need was refrigeration to preserve bodies
and Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra promised refrigerated
containers.
Aid teams were also starting to worry about disease on
the coast, where local sources of drinking water are likely
to have been contaminated by sea water.
se/ds
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