Australia and New Zealand send help to Fiji
Updated
An Australian military C-130 Hercules cargo plane is shortly expected in Suva carrying initial Australian aid to help those affected by Cyclone Tomas. Australia announced an initial one-Million-dollars in emergency assistance after receiving a request from Fiji's interim government.
New Zealand has also responded. One of their Hercules aircraft is in Fiji, and like Australia's aircraft it will assist with air reconnaissance over the disaster area.
Presenter, Linda Mottram
Acting director general of AusAID Peter Baxter
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BAXTER: We have dispatched today an Australian defence force C-130 Hercules aircraft and that aircraft has on it a large amount of relief supplies. It has tents, tarpaulins, water purification tablets and water containers. And these are very much the initial supplies that we've been asked for from the Fijian National Disaster Management Office.
MOTTRAM: Okay, How is that going to be dispersed? Is Australia going to be assisting with that?
BAXTER: Absolutely we have aid personnel on the aircraft as well as defence personnel to assist in dispersing those relief supplies. So the aircraft will land in Suva early this evening Fiji time and then it will travel on to Labasa the capital of the main northern island of Vanua Levu and the distribution of relief supplies will begin from there.
MOTTRAM: Now there's mention that in your announcement that the C-130 itself might also be involved in some surveying functions and medical evacuations. Is that confirmed at this point?
BAXTER: Yeah, one of the problems that the Fiji authorities are facing is the remoteness of some of the areas that have been affected and the fact that communications links are down as a result of the cyclone in many of those areas so they've asked us to conduct aerial surveys to feed into damage assessments so that action can be taken to meet the needs of the population in those particularly eastern parts of Fiji. So tomorrow the 18th of March the Defence Force C-130 will be conducting those aerial surveys and providing damage assessment information to the Fiji Disaster Management Office. If there are people that require medical evacuation and treatment either at hospitals in Fiji or in Australia then we're happy to look at providing assistance in that area as well.
MOTTRAM: Now you have mentioned several times that Australia has been asked to give this assistance. That request specifically comes through the Fiji disaster management office?
BAXTER: Yes it comes through them on behalf of the Fiji interim government and we did receive an official request late yesterday.
MOTTRAM: So political differences are not getting in the way here?
BAXTER: Australia has a long history of separating political issues from humanitarian emergency response and you'll probably recall last year Fiji suffered very major floods in parts of the main island of Viti Levu and other areas. We provided three Million at that stage in humanitarian relief and this is very much in the same kind of vein.
MOTTRAM: And that also explains why or how an Australian Defence Force aircraft with defence force personnel on it can land in Fiji in these circumstances?
BAXTER: The Fiji authorities want quick and effective help and they realise that the best way to get that is for us to be able to use the assets that we have available including defence assets and they're very comfortable with that?
MOTTRAM: And is there a possibility that Australia will provide more assistance in coming days, weeks?
BAXTER: In addition to the relief supplies we've dispatched from Australia we're also providing funding to the National Disaster Management Office, 300-thousand Australian dollars, to assist them to hire helicopters and boats to conduct damage survey and provide relief and also to provide supplies that they can transport on those helicopters and boats out to the more remote places. And we're providing 200-thousand dollars to the Fiji Red Cross to also conduct humanitarian assistance operations. Once the damage assessments become clearer, we've indicated that we're willing to look at providing further assistance and that the assistance we've provided to date is an initial package. And so we'll look at the damage assessments with the government of Fiji and see where we can provide further assistance where that's necessary.
