"People are looting. But they are not looting because they are evil, but because they are hungry." - Red Cross official Irman Rachmat in Banda Aceh, Indonesia
"There was a three-hour gap between the tremors and the wave. People want to know why there was no alert." - Meena Raman, in Malaysia
"The whole bottom floor of the hotel was flooded and everything for 100 metres to the left and right of the building was completely flattened. A village had disappeared. We saw fishing boats which had landed on the roofs of houses." - Martin Lane, Mitchelstown, Co Cork
"The water went back, back, back and everyone wondered what it was. Then we saw the wave come, and we ran." - Katri Seppanen, who was on Phuket with her family
"Why did you do this to us, God? What did we do to upset you? This is worse than death." - A woman grieving in a devastated fishing village in Tamil Nadu state, India
"I cannot ask a man who has lost his family and home to boil his water before drinking it." - Medical officer at the government hospital in Nagappattinam, India
"Our nation is in peril here. Life, as we know it in this country, is in some parts gone." - Ahmed Shaheed, chief government spokesman in the Maldives
"Whether they can afford tickets or not, we will . . . give them everything until they are home." - Thaksin Shinawatara, prime minister of Thailand
- (Guardian Service)
