Practically the entire population of Belarus was exposed to radioactive iodine for several months after the disaster.

Roosevelt waited to act until after the catastrophe, and he has been revered as a savior.

A calamity is inevitable unless we change.

Soon after the disaster, the government announced that reconstruction demand and higher prices would bring about relatively rapid economic recovery.

International assistance tends to reach its peak in the immediate aftermath of a disaster.

We commend the local communities, which were the first to respond following the disaster.

Our assessments enabled our headquarters in Geneva to issue the first preliminary appeal for support just eight hours after the disaster struck.

After the disaster of August 1922 and the rout of the Greeks by Mustafa Kemal's forces, the remnants of the Greek Army revolted in September, and the government was deposed.

Even now, almost 20 years after the disaster, the entire range of post Chernobyl problems continues to be a heavy burden on the shoulders of the people of Belarus.

The result has been a disaster in Africa, with farm productivity stagnant for decades.

Nearly a year has passed since the disaster, but the situation in the Maldives has not eased.

In fact, out of a total of 800 million in pledges, only 17 million has been disbursed one year after the disaster.

The disaster showed the importance of heeding the warning signs, coming together in advance of the calamity and sustaining a collective effort to end human misery and lay solid foundations for peace and development.

Voltaire actively rejected Leibnizian optimism after the natural disaster, convinced that if this were the best possible world, it should surely be better than it is.

3. should give double salaries to the door keeper and lift maintenance workers, all these are highly risky jobs and they probably have to take all the blame when disasters happen.

But there is also a higher risk of disaster, owing to a seemingly inborn human tendency to extrapolate past returns.

Even today, 60 years after the cataclysm, it is difficult to find words for the suffering, the pain and the humiliation of the victims.

The nuclear meltdown at Chernobyl 20 years ago this month, even more than my launch of perestroika, was perhaps the real cause of the collapse of the Soviet Union five years later.

People are willing to donate hundreds of millions of dollars to help people after a disaster even after a disaster in a wealthy country like Japan but are unwilling to invest anything like the same amount to save lives before a predictable disaster strikes.

Before the disaster, Japan issued about 1.5 billion in earthquake related catastrophe bonds as a risk management device the debt is canceled if a precisely defined seismic event occurs.

And, though the Russian diplomatic initiative (based on a joint proposal with Iran) averted this disaster, everything has its price.

A failure in both would be disastrous even if the major emerging market countries have attained self sustaining growth.

But America s extraordinary efforts to rein in Israel might not be enough to avert a calamity.

Such a declaration shall be made subsequent to the natural disaster and prior to the deployment of the operation.

However, since we cannot prevent the disaster or predict its magnitude, the recovery process is therefore of paramount importance.

Insurance policies that clearly specify the amounts that will be paid and the types of damage that will be covered are far better than the government administered, after the fact bailout that many people seem to have expected.

Add a higher bar for government bailouts, and these stronger incentives would induce private financial institutions and investors to take responsibility before disaster strikes.

It s not surprising that those who helped create the problems and didn t see the disaster coming have not done a masterly job in dealing with it.

It also demonstrated that developing countries still do not have wide access to such solutions, not only during the disaster response phase, but also during the more important preparedness phase of the disaster cycle, which invariably results in unnecessary loss of life and property when disaster strikes.

The host State could make such a declaration subsequent to the disaster and prior to the initiation of the operation.

Polish adventurers entered the town of Pripyat in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone and turned on lights for the first time since the 1986 nuclear disaster at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant.

Self Defence Forces arrive at the scene of the tsunami in Japan.

a) Integrate a gender perspective in post disaster relief, recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts and ensure that women take an active and equal role in all phases of disaster management and post disaster recovery and

Consequently, relying on low failure probabilities, national policies, the caution of private actors, and monitoring by regulators seems to be insufficient to prevent catastrophe.

Earlier this year, the African Union, through the good work of former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, averted a calamity in Kenya after a disputed election led to widespread violence.

The dome was reconstructed after the 1927 earthquake.

How can we meet the challenge of effective relief, rehabilitation and reconstruction, as well as pre disaster warning and preparations? That continues to the responsibility of the United Nations.

We are meeting here today to discuss ways and means of mitigating to the greatest extent possible the impact of the substantial damage suffered by the affected countries. We cannot remain idle, waiting for similar disasters to happen.

Of course, hindsight is always easy.

Today's public meeting is being held a short time after the attacks in London.

The US ambassador to Indonesia, Cameron Hume, is actively trying to prevent a catastrophe. So far, there has been insufficient support from senior US officials.

This was after Katrina. We were the first commercial fleet of airplanes to be cleared into the disaster impact zone.

The subsequent ignominious fall of Singapore was described by Winston Churchill as the worst disaster and largest capitulation in British history .

In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, efforts focused on search and rescue, bringing clean water, food, clothing, medical care and shelter to survivors, and identifying and burying the vast number of dead.

Disaster and Development