More housing needed to help tsunami victims, UN relief coordinator says

Following a visit to the tsunami-affected region of Indonesia, the United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator has praised efforts to feed, clothe and house the victims of the disaster while cautioning that more permanent housing will be needed before the impending rainy season.

"We have been feeding more or less everybody who is in need," said Jan Egeland. "We provided medical assistance, we provided water, and we provided sanitation in very difficult circumstances."

But reconstruction has gone slower than expected, and with the rainy season beginning, many people in Aceh will urgently need shelter, he said.

Mr. Egeland stressed the need to coordinate shelter-building activities among agencies more closely. Eric Morris, who had been in charge of developing a six-month transitional and permanent shelter plan, has been designated to head that effort.

The plan for the next six months is to move all people out of tents and more than 100,000 into new transitional shelter while building tens of thousands of new permanent houses, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). The overall goal is to get all inhabitants into permanent housing before next year's rainy season.