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Up to 12:00, May 31, the 8.0-magnitude earthquake that jolted Wenchuan County, Sichuan Province had left 68,977 people dead, 367,854 injured and 17,974 missing. The total number of people affected by the earthquake reached 45,547,565. The earthquake brought grave damages to the infrastructural facilities, cutting off road communications and electricity and water supplies and leveling almost all the buildings in the affected areas. This is the biggest casualty China has suffered in the past 30 years since reform and opening up.

This sudden natural disaster drew keenest attention of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the State Council, and gripped the hearts of the people of all ethnic groups in China, Chinas friends in various countries as well as all the staff of the CPAFFC. The CPAFFC immediately set up a leading group to direct its earthquake relief work. It collected donations among its staff for the quake-hit regions. While receiving messages of condolences from international friendship organizations and personages, it provided information on Chinas relief efforts to win international assistance. It did its best to collect material most needed in the quake-hit areas, and organized its staff to observe the national mourning at its compound. Through what it has done, the CPAFFC has demonstrated to the compatriots in the quake-affected areas that in face of calamities they are not alone and that under the firm leadership of the CPC Central Committee and the State Council, with the assistance and support of the people the world over and the efforts made by the people of the whole country including comrades in the CPAFFC, a total victory in earthquake relief will surely be achieved.

Setting Up Relief Work Leading Group

After the earthquake struck,the Executive Committee of the CPAFFC National Council gave great importance to it and took prompt action.

President Chen Haosu telephoned Qin Lin, president of the Sichuan Provincial People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (SIFA) on the evening of May 12. The line had been cut off by the earthquake. He tried time and again and finally got through on the morning of May 13. President Chen inquired about the damages in Sichuan and expressed solicitude to the comrades of the SIFA. He promised to mobilize all the comrades in the CPAFFC immediately to join the countrys relief efforts.

In the meantime, Vice President Li Xiaolin who was on a visit overseas called in, requesting that everyone in the CPAFFC closely follow the situation of the quake-ravaged areas and provide assistance as required by the overall relief efforts.

At 8:30 on May 13, the Executive Committee convened an emergency meeting, at which a decision was made to allocate 300,000 RMB yuan for disaster relief. The money would be passed to the quake-hit areas through the SIFA.

At 8:45, President Chen Haosu called an emergency meeting of directors and directors general to arrange the work of disaster relief.

After the meeting, the 1st class emergency response plan of the CPAFFC was activated. CPAFFC president headed the earthquake relief leading group and the secretary general, a member of the leading group, led the disaster relief office.

At noon on May 13, a notice to raise money for the quake-affected people was issued.

At 15:00, a day after the massive earthquake, the staff of the CPAFFC donated the first sum of 25,435 yuan to the people in the quake-hit areas.

At 16:00, the CPAFFC sent a letter of condolences and made a telegraphic transfer of 300,000 yuan to the SIFA.

The disaster relief work carried out in the CPAFFC for just over one day aroused the enthusiasm of all comrades for further relief efforts.

Mourning for the Quake Victims

May 19 started the first national mourning period announced by the State Council. In that period, the whole country expressed grief over the death of quake victims. To express our deep sorrow, a solemn bell-ringing ceremony was held at the CPAFFC.

At 14:20, all the staff of the CPAFFC gathered around the Peace Bell Pavilion. The ceremony was presided over by CPAFFC Vice President Li Jianping. Sim Jae-duck, member of the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea, who was in Beijing on a visit, and his party, also attended the ceremony.

All present watched CCTV live broadcast programme on the relief and rescue efforts at the epicentre. At 14:28, the staff of the CPAFFC, together with the people throughout China, observed a three-minute silence for those who died in the earthquake. Seven young staffers walked up and struck the bell. The chimes of the bell joined the sound of sirens and car horns reverberating over Beijing to express the profound grief for the victims who died in the earthquake.

In his speech made after the silent tribute, President Chen Haosua expressed condolences over the death of our compatriots in the Wenchuan earthquake and great respect for the commanders and soldiers of the Peoples Liberation Army and the Armed Police and the medical personnel who were working at the rescue and relief front as well as people across the country who were making arduous relief efforts. President Chen also expressed gratitude to Chinas foreign friends who rendered us valuable assistance in times of distress and who extended condolences for our compatriots who died in the devastating quake. (Full text of the speech on p.7)

At the end of the ceremony, a box was placed at the Peace Bell Pavilion to collect money for the earthquake-affected people. CPAFFC staffers lined up in a long queue to put their donations into it.

More Tents Needed

By May 31, the staffers of the CPAFFC had donated 305,745 yuan and the CPAFFC 335,000 yuan to the quake-hit areas. The CPAFFC had received 137 messages of condolences from friendship organizations and friendly personages in 74 countries and regions. Through the CPAFFC, friendship organizations and personages both at home and abroad had donated money and material reaching a total value of 2,110,500 yuan. In addition, it had also received 2,607 tents of different sizes, medical supplies, blankets, drinking water and other needed material from our friends in various countries. They have let us feel that the sympathy of the world people is the most valuable support.

On the evening of May 20, the CPAFFC received an extra urgent telegram from the Sichuan Provincial Government. As the relief work was entering a critical phase, 3 million tents were needed in the quake-hit areas to make temporary shelters for people displaced by the earthquake, and at the time the Ministry of Civil Affairs had only 200,000-odd tents at hand for distribution.

There was a shortage of more than 2.7 million tents. What could be done? At this urgent moment, the Sichuan Provincial Government thought of the CPAFFC, through which to seek help from the international community. As one of the major people-to-people organizations in China with a history of 54 years, the CPAFFC has established long-term close friendly relations with 458 friendship organizations in 158 countries and regions in the world and oversees the work of establishing friendship relations between provinces/cities of China and their counterparts in other countries, the number of which has reached more than 1,500 pairs. This is indeed a tremendous resource.

It was the unshirkable duty of the CPAFFC to answer to the request by the Sichuan Provincial Government. Early the next morning, President Chen Haosu called an emergency meeting of director generals to arrange the work of seeking assistance from foreign friendship organizations and friends. In the afternoon, letters and telegrams asking for urgent assistance of relief tents were sent out to various parts of the world.

Realizing that time was pressing and the international help could not meet the immediate needs of the people in the disaster areas due to long distance, the CPAFFC then sent out its staffers to look for tents in the Beijing markets. They obtained 38 of them. When the tents were carried to the CPAFFC, they were packed with well-wishing words sewn on the wrappings showing care and love from the CPAFFC. The 38 tents left for the quake-hit areas on May 25 in a train loaded together with other relief material Beijing provided for Shifang City.

CPAFFC Vice President Li Xiaolin was on a visit overseas when the earthquake struck. She closely followed the situation and the relief work in the earthquake-stricken areas. When she learnt that tents were in urgent need, she immediately contacted Mr. Zhang Xueyuan in the United States, through whom she got the information of a supply of 30 tents. With the enthusiastic help of Hong Kong friends Mr. Lam Kin Chung, Madam Chan Fusheng and Dr. Ho Hau Wong, she soon got the sum of 500,000 Hong Kong dollars (about 60,000 US dollars) needed for the purchase of these tents. The tents were transported to Sichuan by UPS of the United States free of charge. To buy the 30 American military tents, Vice President Li Xiaolin resorted to all her connections from the government departments to charity institutions, logistic companies and even her personal friends. It took less than two days from looking for supply to getting them sent to the quake-hit areas in Sichuan.

At present, the CPAFFC still receives messages of condolences and relief material from friendship organizations and friendly personages of various countries, who in different forms express their profound sympathy and solicitude for the people in the disaster areas.

Though 20 days have passed since the earthquake struck Wenchuan, the Earthquake-Relief Office of the CPAFFC is still operating. The staff of the CPAFFC will translate their concern and care for the people in the quake-affected areas into action in their everyday work, take the relief work as a long-term task, and exert persistent efforts till the day of final victory.