As of November 6, there are still over 200,00 people living at temporary shelters, most of them lost their houses from the earthquake and tsunami on September 28. They did not just lose their houses, all the personal belongings, memories, and many also lost their family members and friends.

City of Palu, is one of the most affected area where PWJ and our local partner ACT have been working to provide disaster affected families and communities with basic house holds and food items.

Humanitarian and civil society agencies working in Rakhine State in Myanmar and in the Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh are deeply concerned that the repatriation of refugees will commence in mid-November, according to an announcement of the Joint Working Group of the Governments of Bangladesh and Myanmar on 30th October.

The Governments of Myanmar and Bangladesh have made assurances to the refugees and the international community that repatriation will only happen when it is safe, voluntary and dignified. We call on both governments to stand by their commitments.

Magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck the island of Sulawesi, Indonesia, which triggered tsunami and caused major devastation in the area. On October 1, 2018, Peace Winds Japan (PWJ) staff reached the island of Sulawesi, Indonesia, and began assessing the situation to identify the needs to provide emergency relief assistance to those in need.

As of now, the death toll has bee reported as 832, however the number is expected to increase as parts of the island still lacks communication means.

On September 14, Peace Winds Japan/A-PAD Japan Search and SAR and emergency response teams arrived in the Philippines ahead of Typhoon Mangkhut (local name: Ompong) was to make a landfall in northern Philippines. The team was met with our local partners, Citizens’ Disaster Response Center (CDRC), APAD-Philippines. and received briefing of the situation.

Typhoon Mangkhut kept its strength as category 5, and landed in the northeastern Luzon island early Saturday morning on September 15.

One year passed since the beginning of the exodus of an estimated 706,000 Rohingya refugees from Rakhine State, Myanmar to Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh following what the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights called a “textbook example” of ethnic cleansing. The newly arrived Rohingya in Cox’s Bazar have joined hundreds of thousands who were part of previous waves of displacement from Myanmar.