Thousands Of Chilean
Troops Sent To Prevent Looting In Quake-Hit
Concepción
SANTIAGO - Chilean president Michelle
Bachelet sent on Monday thousands of extra
troops to the main quake disaster area in
the city of Concepcion as angry and hungry
residents set fire to department stores.
The toll from Saturday's 8.8-magnitude
earthquake and the resulting tsunami that
swept central and southern coastal towns
rose to 723, with tens disappeared, as
security fears deepened in Concepcion, the
worst-hit urban area.
Troops deployed alongside police and Deputy
Interior Minister Patricio Rosende said one
person was shot and killed as they clamped
down on rampant looting overnight, making
160 arrests.
“When we take account of the troops already
in Biobio and Maule there will be by
tomorrow 7,000 troops deployed” said
Bachelet, as she stepped up efforts to
crackdown on the looting and arson.
“I call on the responsibility and conscience
of people, we all have to collaborate,
pillage, looting delinquency is not
acceptable”, said President Bachelet, during
a brief meeting with the press.
The UN's humanitarian coordination office (OCHA)
in Geneva said it had been sent a list of
priorities that included field hospitals,
mobile bridges, communications equipment and
disaster assessment and coordination teams.
After touring the disaster zone,
President-elect Sebastian Piñera said “the
situation is worse than expected” and
recounted hearing cries for help when he
entered a collapsed building not yet reached
by rescue teams.
Rescuers with heat sensors and sniffer dogs
picked through the debris of shattered
buildings in Concepcion and special cameras
showed three, perhaps four, survivors
trapped in the twisted ruins of a 15-story
apartment block.
Injured people prepared to sleep out for a
third night, still rattled every so often by
aftershocks. A staggering 121 with a
magnitude greater than 5.0 have come since
Saturday's quake -- one of the most powerful
ever recorded.
The government has purchased all the food in
Concepcion's big supermarkets so it could be
distributed for free, and a barge and two
Chilean air force planes were expected later
with more supplies.
But Piñera said the situation in Concepcion
was dangerous: “When we have a catastrophe
of this magnitude, when there is no
electricity and no water, the population...
starts losing the sense of public order.”
The scale of the devastation was still
coming to light in seaside towns and
villages engulfed by the massive waves that
followed not long after the gigantic quake
struck at 3:34 am Saturday. State television
reported that more than 300 bodies had been
found in the swamped fishing village of
Constitucion. Some two million people, an
eighth of Chile's entire population, were
said to be affected.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da
Silva became the first foreign leader to
visit since the disaster, expressing
solidarity with the quake victims as he met
with Bachelet briefly at Santiago airport
before flying home. Related article: Chile
quake far bigger but less deadly than Haiti
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, on a
Latin America tour that will include a brief
stop in Chile on Tuesday, said she had
spoken with Bachelet and was bringing
satellite telephones with her.
“They have asked for communications
equipment, some of which I'm bringing on our
plane. Other technical equipment will be
flown there in addition.” |
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