The speed, effectiveness and transparency of China's response to the devastating May 12 earthquake last year are "very impressive," and "very much appreciated by the international community," the United Nations relief chief said on Monday.

In an exclusive interview with Xinhua, John Holmes, the UN under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator, said: "What was impressive, I think, was the way the Chinese authorities, local and centrally, responded to that, the speed with which they did that, the effectiveness with which they did that and I think also, the openness, which I think is worth mentioning, which was very much appreciated by the international community."

The magnitude-8.0 quake that hit southwest China, including many parts of Sichuan Province, on May 12, 2008 killed more than 69,000 people. It also left nearly 18,000 missing, more than 374,000 injured and millions homeless.

"This was a huge earthquake with huge repercussions on the people of the area, both in terms of people killed and injured and of course the massive destruction of property, residential property, factories, schools, hospitals," Holmes said. "The impact was absolutely enormous."

As the first anniversary of the massive Wenchuan earthquake approaches, the message Holmes has for the Chinese government and people is "one of renewed condolences on the magnitude of the disaster and the magnitude of the losses that China suffered."

Impressive response

"As I say, it was an enormous tragedy and it will take many years to recover from it fully," Holmes said. "But we were very impressed by those efforts and by the capacity by the Chinese government has acquired in terms of responding to disasters, and by the amounts of resources that China was able to mobilize to deal with this, both in terms of the People's Liberation Army and other people who were able to help, the amount of efforts that have gone in since then to actually rebuilding property and so on, and beginning to establish basic services."

"This was a very impressive operation in a very, very tragic situation, and we were able to help a little bit," he said. "I don't want to exaggerate the degree of international help; for example, from the central fund, we were able to offer US$8 million to help with some of the immediate aid and assistance, and we are attempting through the UN agencies who work in China, to help with the recovery and reconstruction process as well."

"As I say, it is a relatively small amount compared to the overall response from the Chinese authorities but we think it's valuable, we hope it's appreciated and we want to go on working with you in what will be, as I say, is a very long-term process of recovery and reconstruction despite the speed, with which you are tackling it at the moment," he said.

During his recent two-day visit to China, Holmes was given an account by various government officials and the Chinese earthquake administration on China's post-quake reconstruction work.

"I think what I was most impressed by was the plans for rebuilding the permanent housing for the 5 million people or more who were made homeless by this earthquake," he said. "The idea is within a very short period of time, within a year or two from now, everybody will have been re-housed in proper housing. That is an enormous task but clearly that's the ambition the government has set for itself, and I have no doubt with China's capacity to mobilize resources, to mobilize people, and to galvanize activity, that's what will happen."

On April 22, Chinese Vice Premier Hui Liangyu met with visiting Holmes, and Hui said that China has made remarkable progress in enhancing its risk management and disaster reduction capabilities. This is a great contribution to the global humanitarian cause.

Good example from China

"China, unfortunately for you, is a very disaster-prone country," Holmes said. "It is so enormous you have virtually every threat that we know about and every given year there are bound to be several significant disasters."

"That means you have acquired an enormous amount of experience, sadly, in dealing with disasters, but you've also come to recognize, earlier, I think than many others, the value of reducing the impact of those disasters before they happen," he said.

"A very good example is the work that's been done on China's main rivers in trying to reduce the impact of the flooding, which is going to happen in one way or another virtually every year, and some years can be extremely bad," he said.

"We believe that China set a good example there because this is a demonstration that money invested in those kinds of measures is a good investment," he said. "It brings benefits, it saves lives, it reduces damage and that's a better investment than money simply spent afterwards on responding to disaster after it has happened."

"I think that's an absolutely crucial lesson to the world," he said. "We face more and more disasters, natural disasters in the future, not least because of climate change, which is going to produce more floods and more hurricanes and more droughts in different areas, for example."

"Therefore, disaster risk reduction will be even more important in the future than it is now," he said. "As I say, China has a lot of experience to offer, has a lot of practical lessons to offer other people, and we hope China will play a very central role in discussing this at international levels."

(Xinhua News Agency May 5, 2009)