ANDAMAN AND NICOBAR ISLANDS RETAIN THE SCARS OF THE 2004

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 05 KOLKATA 000086 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS PACOM FOR POL/AD E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PGOV EAID SENV PHUM ECON MARR IN BM TH ID SUBJECT: ANDAMAN AND NICOBAR ISLANDS RETAIN THE SCARS OF THE 2004 TSUNAMI SIPDIS REF: A) 05 CALCUTTA 186 B) 06 CALCUTTA 00103 ¶1. (SBU) SUMMARY. March 2-7, ConGen visited the Union Territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands to assess recovery from the December 2004 tsunami and related issues such as the environment, economic conditions and strategic concerns. Two years after the tsunami devastated parts of the island chain, causing 3,513 deaths (436 dead, 3077 still missing),inundating 20,000 acres and making 46,000 people homeless, progress has been made in housing and providing financial assistance and social support. However, the resultant culture of dependency could make the transition from government largesse to self-sustaining employment difficult. Unemployed tsunami victims appear reluctant to seek work while receiving free rations, housing and even television and radios. As a result, companies managing the many recovery projects and those in the resurgent private sector are bringing in workers from the mainland. The influx of outside labor is straining an already fragile island eco-system, with water available to the people only one hour every three days. The Joint Andaman and Nicobar Islands military command was also seriously affected by the tsunami, suffering the almost complete destruction of its air SIPDIS force base at Car Nicobar. However, according to its senior commanders, the air field was soon operational after the tsunami and the command is looking to expand its role in the region and to conduct more joint exercises as evidenced by the presence of an Indonesian frigate that was paying a port call at the time. The military was focused on protecting the islands from a regular flow of Thai, Burmese and other illegal fisherman and marine poachers. With only 38 islands inhabited of a total of in 572 in the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago, much of the region's environment is well preserved but population pressures, growing commercial development and infiltration by illegal poachers threaten this bio-diversity hotspot. END SUMMARY. -------------- Background -------------- ¶2. (U) Geography. The Union Territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands is an archipelago of 572 islands, about 38 of which are inhabited, with its capital in Port Blair. These islands are divided into two groups -- the Andamans to the north and the Nicobars to the south. The entire chain, 800 km in length, lies closer to Burma and Indonesia than to mainland India. Their contiguous waters comprise 30 percent of India's maritime exclusive economic zone. The southern islands are of particular strategic importance given their location overlooking the Six Degree Channel near the entrance to the Straits of Malacca. Some 50,000 vessels transit these Straits each year, carrying between one-fifth and one quarter of the world's sea trade. Half of all oil shipments carried by sea come through the Straits, an estimated 11 million barrels a day. ¶3. (U) Population. The islands population numbers are vague, ranging from an official figures of 375,000 to 550,000; of which the indigenous population comprises a small, but highly protected minority of about 30,000 people. These include some of the last true Neolithic cultures. In the Andamans, these are the Onge, Great Andamanese, Jarawa, and Sentinelese, all tribes of apparently African origin. The Nicobars are home to two groups, the Nicobarese and the Shompen, both of apparently East Asian origin. While all the groups remain secluded to some extent, only the Sentinelese are fully isolated, and extremely hostile to outsiders. The vast majority of the islands' inhabitants are migrants from mainland India. Early migrants were primarily Bengalis; whereas later migrants are mostly Tamil, and some friction has developed between the two linguistic groups. ¶4. (U) Economy. The government is the largest employer. Tourism continues to show enormous growth potential, despite a sharp decline since the tsunami. Until a 1996 Supreme Court decision protected the Andamans' forest resources, timber was a KOLKATA 00000086 002 OF 005 major source of revenue. Plantation agriculture - coconut and rubber -- is significant, although many coconut groves in Nicobar were devastated by the tsunami. The islanders fish actively near to shore, but the rich offshore pelagic resource is largely untouched except occasionally by poaching vessels of other nations. ¶5. (U) Politics. Because it is a Trust Territory, the Indian Home Ministry appoints a Lieutenant Governor, currently Lieutenant General (retd.) Bhopinder Singh, to govern the islands. Although it has one elected Member in the Lok Sahba, Manoranjan Bhakta of the Congress Party, it has no elected island legislature. As a result, the government is run entirely by bureaucrats appointed to serve temporary duty in the islands. ¶6. (SBU) Security. Port Blair is the headquarters of an integrated command, the Joint Andaman and Nicobar Command. Indian forces have significant peacetime operational roles such as combating poaching, piracy, drugs and gun-running, being near the Malacca Straits and the Six Degree Channel, and the Indian Navy is involved in intense patrolling of the sea-lanes. The Indian military presence has also been increased at Diglipur in North Andamans in response to the presence of a Chinese listening post on Burmese territory in the nearby Coco Islands. The Coast Guard is active in monitoring illegal movements, especially fishing and smuggling, in Indian territorial waters. A large air and military base on Car Nicobar was practically wiped out by the tsunami with heavy loss of life, but was rapidly rebuilt. Due to security concerns,all foreign visitors are required to have a Restricted Area Permit (RAP) in order to visit the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. While tourism is important in the Andamans, few foreigners are ever granted permission to visit the Nicobars (REF A). -------------- Tsunami's Impact SIPDIS -------------- ¶7. (U) In the morning of December 26, 2004, the Andaman and Nicobar archipelago was rocked by one of the more severe earthquakes experienced in the region in recent times and were then battered by the resulting tsunami waves. The Nicobar group of islands, only 163 kilometers from Banda Aceh, Indonesia, was hardest hit. The shifting grounds and the resulting waves changed the geography of Nicobar. The tremors were measured at a magnitude of 9.3. There were 22 tremors of 5+ magnitude on that day itself. Since 2004, there have been at least 5,000 tremors with 5+ magnitude. Administration officials, quoting geologists, said that this was in a way better for the archipelago to stabilize as stored energy is being released fast. As a result of the earthquake, 10,000 acres of island were submerged, along with 350 acres that has risen up from the sea. Geologists have found that the earthquake also caused a northeast-southwest tilt of the island landmass. New shorelines have been formed in the North Andamans, whereas Indira Point, at the southern-most part of the island has decreased in elevation by 1.8 m. To the north, the more populated and developed Andamans experienced greater damage to infrastructure. According to official numbers, 3,513 people were killed or missing, 10,000 families were displaced, 10,837 hectares of agricultural land were lost, and 85 schools, 34 health centers and 24 jetties damaged. In response, over the past two years the GOI provided a USD 190 million relief package, shifted 15,000 metric ton of construction material from the mainland and built 9,565 intermediate shelters spread over eight islands. (REF B) -------------- Recovery -------------- ¶8. (U) ConGen visited the Choldari intermediate relief camp to KOLKATA 00000086 003 OF 005 see the conditions of those made homeless by the tsunami. 132 families with 491 people were lodged in blocks of 10ft by 11 ft rooms in galvanized metal sheet shelters. The camp was run by the territory government with the support of NGOs World Vision and the Christian Covenant. The camp was clean and well maintained with a one room school, community center and a basic health care center. Residents at the camp said that although they were provided shelter, free rations, televisions and radios, employment was difficult to obtain. ConGen visited the shelter of a local carpenter who complained that there was no work for him as contractors doing reconstruction projects were bringing in labor from the Indian mainland. ConGen subsequently visited the nearby permanent shelters being constructed for the Choldari relief camp. None of the temporary shelter residents were employed in the work on the permanent shelters. SEEDS NGO representative Mr. Rehman said that the tsunami victims were reluctant to work given the free rations and benefits they were receiving. Another camp official claimed that the contract companies like to bring in outside workers because they are easier to control and manage. All the officials and NGO workers noted that when free rations end in the next few months, the tsunami victims will face a serious shock and may not be able to SIPDIS quickly adapt to economic independence. ¶9. (U) The territory government plans to complete the permanent shelters for the Choldari camp residents before May 2007, prior to the monsoon season. However, progress is slow, given disputes over housing designs and other delays. March 2008 is the goal for completion of 9,797 permanent shelters for all the tsunami refugees. The territory government is posting on-line SIPDIS pictures and status reports on the permanent shelter construction at http://www.and.nic.in/shelterP/index.htm. ¶10. (U) The Andaman Chamber of Commerce (ACC) believes that in addition to the many recovery projects, the local economy is seeing an upturn with key sectors such as tourism and fishing, now at pre-tsunami levels or better. Agriculture was slower in returning, due to loss of land from inundation or salinity. Port Blair's businessmen were unanimous in saying that they were facing an acute shortage of labor and that they were consequently paying higher wages. ACC president Mohammad Jadwet and his colleagues claimed that prolonged relief operations by the island administration had made people relief dependent. They argued that people in intermediate shelters - used to free ration and accommodation -- were unwilling to work, rather than unable. An ACC businessman in shipping said that he could not find local labor for stevedoring and was bringing in workers from Tamil Nadu. Bengalis were another pool for labor and in some cases illegal Bangladeshis have been able to pass themselves off as Indian nationals from West Bengal. To further develop the local economy, territory officials have submitted to the GOI a proposal to construct a large transshipment port in the southern tip of the Great Nicobar Island to service the massive shipping traffic in the area. -------------- The Population Debate -------------- ¶11. (SBU) According to data supplied by Andaman and Nicobar administration, the total population of the islands is 356,000 persons. However, most contacts, including government officers, questioned the official numbers, saying the actual figure was much higher, ranging from 450,000 to 550,000. The tribal population is generally accepted at about 30,000. The continuous influx of outsiders, especially for the reconstruction projects, has prompted a serious debate on the islands' carrying capacity. Environmental groups like Society for Andaman and Nicobar Ecology (SANE) argue that the present population figure of the Andamans is well beyond the islands' capacity. SANE official Samir Acharya told ConGen that the population figures quoted by the administration were suspect and that the actual population could be well around 550,000. He KOLKATA 00000086 004 OF 005 also pointed out that study on Andamans' carrying capacity, undertaken when Rajiv Gandhi was India's Prime Minister, suggested that the archipelago's population should not exceed 480,000 in 2011. Environmental groups in the islands take this figure as the population capacity. Although there are differences over the Andaman's population size, there is broad agreement among ecologists, civil society organizations and activists that the islands have exceeded its carrying capacity. For example, the island is already facing a shortage of fresh water. The municipality supplies piped water for one hour every three days. -------------- Forest Ecology -------------- ¶12. (SBU) Mr. S.S. Choudhury, Andaman's Principal Chief Conservator of Forest, reported that settlement of people was a problem in the islands because 87 percent of the land is notified forest area. About 80 percent of the forest is protected. Different tribes, except for Nicobaris, live in the forests and in most cases have a limited impact on the environment. However, activists say that a regulation issued by Andaman Administration in December 2006, declaring large tracts of forests in Andamans as reserve forest, has in effect taken forest resources away from the tribals. In addition, as with Andaman's population, there is no agreement over the actual percentage of area under forest cover. Again, Samir Acharya notes that while the official statistic of forest cover is very high, actual percentage is much lower as forestry officials do not take into account the degradation of the forest cover. According to Acharya, encroachment and grazing animals have done significant damage to the forest cover and undergrowth. -------------- Military Concerns -------------- ¶13. (SBU) Given the islands' strategic location, straddling major shipping lanes, the Indian military has an important role in the region. During his interaction with the ConGen, Air Marshal P.P. Rajkumar, Commander in Chief, Andaman and Nicobar (CINCAN) observed that CINCAN was an experiment by Indian defense planners in an integrated command involving the Indian Army, Navy, Air Force and the Coast Guard. There was a possibility that the Integrated Command model would be replicated in other commands, although there were unresolved difficulties of coordinating the command structure and hardware. Such a view was, however, questioned by junior officers, who believed that the Indian military was incapable of supporting integrated military commands, combining all the services under one chain of command. CINCAN and his staff agreed on the need for joint patrolling with other countries of the busy sea lane that passes within 20 nautical miles of the southernmost part of the archipelago. CINCAN is already involved in joint patrolling of the Malacca strait sea lane and was interested in joint exercises with U.S. forces. During ConGen's visit to Port Blair, Indonesian frigate Kri Iman Banjol called on Port Blair as part of the ninth cycle of coordinated patrols with the Indian Navy. The purpose of the coordinated patrol was to prevent smuggling, piracy, drug trafficking and illegal fishing. ¶14. (SBU) These transnational crimes, especially illegal fishing, are difficult to combat in such an expansive area with over 500 uninhabited islands. According to Air Marshal Rajkumar on average a ship a month, of mostly Thai and Burmese fishermen, is detained. The detainees often remain imprisoned or in legal limbo for several years. The presence of the fishermen has also become a serious public health issue for the islands. The GOI HIV/AIDS office Director Dr. Mishri Lal noted that there were approximately 300 HIV positive persons in the islands, half of whom were Burmese and Thai fishermen who were in prison for poaching. An NGO official added that these 150 or so prisoners KOLKATA 00000086 005 OF 005 were allowed work outside confinement during the day, but returned to the prisons at night. Dr. Lal said that since 1992, there have been 38 known cases of AIDS and 37 have died. One woman with AIDS recently left for Andhra Pradesh and her status is unknown. ¶15. (SBU) COMMENT. The Andaman and Nicobar Islands, recovering from the ravages of the 2004 tsunami, remain a beautiful and unique corner of India, being closer to Southeast Asia than South Asia. The territory offers good opportunities for future U.S. cooperation in helping the region preserve its great biodiversity in the face of growing population pressures. In addition, the islands' joint military command recognizes the importance of closer cooperation with the U.S. military and other militaries in the region and is receptive to more joint exercises. The military officers readily conceded the difficulty of patrolling such a large archipelago with their present resources. Given the Islands' strategic position, greater Indo-U.S. military cooperation would help to protect a key shipping lane. As the Indo-U.S. relationship grows, even remote areas such as the Andaman and Nicobar Islands warrant consideration for closer Indo-U.S. cooperation. JARDINE