Relatives and friends of tsunami victims return to pay their respects

A total of 137 visitors are expected to attend memorial events in Thailand, while another 15 will do so in Sri Lanka.

As final preparations were made for official commemoration ceremonies, mourners yesterday held small, quiet prayer gatherings of their own. In India, children dressed in white walked down a street where thousands were washed away.

Those who have returned for the anniversary include 64-year-old Brian Lowe, from Glasgow, who was on holiday with his wife Rosie, on the south coast of Sri Lanka, when disaster struck.

In an extraordinary turn of events, not only did they manage to survive the tidal waves that destroyed their hotel, but with the help of a local politician and kind-hearted Sri Lankan people, they escaped the carnage of the aftermath and found refuge after a two-day journey through the countryside.

Another surviving Scot returning to pay his respects was Cameron Hunter, 35, a chemistry teacher from Dalry, Ayrshire.

A year ago he was on Bang Tao beach in Phuket, Thailand with his wife Shima and sons Kyle, three, and Calum, 18 months. They escaped after being pulled from the water by Thai locals.

Eleven-year-old Tilly Smith, who saved about 100 people on a beach in Phuket when she remembered the warning signs for a tsunami from a school geography lesson, was set to read a poem at a memorial service in Thailand.

She suffered nightmares for months after the disaster, and her family want to overcome their demons and show support for the Thai people. It was yesterday revealed that a French children's magazine, Mon Quotidien, had named Tilly as its Child of the Year.

Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor, the leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales, also travelled to Sri Lanka yesterday to mark the anniversary. The Archbishop of Westminster will inspect relief and reconstruction projects.

The horrifying events of 26 December, 2004 remain etched on the memories of people around the world.

The raging waves devastated everything in their path. From Indonesia in the east to Somalia in the west, the tsunami caused massive destruction.

Officials figures have put the toll of dead and missing at more than 216,000. Over two million were left homeless by the giant waves, triggered by a powerful earthquake that ripped apart the ocean floor.

A total of 149 British nationals died as a result of the tsunami - 129 in Thailand, 17 in Sri Lanka and three in the Maldives.

For the anniversary, the Thai government has organised a series of ceremonies at six venues: Ban Namkem and Bang Niang Beach in Phang-nga province; Kamala Beach, Patong Beach and the Khao Memorial Wall in Phuket; and on Phi Phi island.

In Indonesia's worst-hit province, Aceh, some survivors went to a mass grave where the unidentified bodies of almost 47,000 victims are buried.

"Now that I have come here I somehow feel satisfied," said Dasniati, who laid petals on the grave at Lamboro, outside the devastated provincial capital of Banda Aceh.

She believes the body of her 10-year-old daughter, Yaul, was among the thousands dumped into pits in the days immediately after the tragedy.

Christmas with baby born after brush with death

A COUPLE yesterday celebrated their first Christmas with the baby they named after the island on which they almost died during the tsunami. Caroline Day, 36, and her partner Paul Holden, 37, of Brampton, Cambridgeshire, spent Boxing Day clinging to a tree to escape the floodwater. Their daughter was born in August and the couple named her Meera - after the Maldives island where they were staying.

Good progress made on aid effort

MINISTERS today said "good progress" had been made in helping to rebuild countries devastated by the tsunami.

The UK has allocated the equivalent of 290 million for relief and longer-term reconstruction across the region.

Of that total, the Department for International Development (DFID) committed 75 million for immediate relief operations and a further 65 million for reconstruction across the region.

The rest of the total is made up of debt relief, Gift Aid tax relief and contributions through the EU.

A further 372 million has been raised by the British public through donations to the Disaster Emergency Committee, of which 128 million has been spent on relief and reconstruction during 2005.

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the Red Cross Tsunami Support Network had worked hard to offer support to all those affected.

"That important work will continue, as does learning the lessons of where we could have done better," he said.

"The prayers and best wishes of people throughout the UK are with you at this difficult time."

International Development Secretary, Hilary Benn, said: "A year ago today a devastating earthquake and tsunami took the lives of more than 200,000 people across south Asia and east Africa. The impact of this disaster is still felt today.

"Many people not only lost loved ones, but also their homes and businesses. Good progress has been made in all countries affected by the tsunami."

He said over 70 per cent of damaged health facilities in Indonesia were now rebuilt or under construction and in Sri Lanka over 90 per cent of children living in areas affected by the tsunami are attending schools.

The London-based Merlin medical aid agency is contributing to the British aid effort by building three hospitals on the east coast of Sri Lanka.

Meanwhile, Cambridge police officer Kay Stevens is to hand over 500 homes to tsunami victims in Aceh, the Indonesian province worst-affected by the disaster. PC Stevens, from Cambridge, took a year off her work as a sergeant to help build houses in Indonesia.

Workers regain employment after disaster

MORE than half the people who lost jobs across the tsunami-hit region are now back at work, according to Oxfam International.

The livelihoods of fishermen, small-scale agricultural workers, labourers, business owners and individuals linked to the tourism sector were hardest hit. But 60 per cent of the people who lost jobs are earning a living again and Oxfam said 1.4 million people whose livelihoods were affected have been lifted out of poverty.

More than half of the children in tsunami-affected areas are living in fear of another similar disaster, according to a survey.

The research by Unicef showed 62 per cent of children in Sri Lanka, 54 per cent in Indonesia and 39 per cent in Thailand still feared they would be hit by a second tsunami or earthquake.

It also showed that youngsters in Indonesia have the least optimistic view of the future - one third of them believe their lives will not improve.

The experience drawn from Bosnia's mass graves is helping DNA scientists in Sarajevo put names to bodies in a mortuary at a tsunami-ravaged Thai holiday resort 5,000 miles away.

A victim of the tsunami had survived the 9/11 attacks three years earlier, it has emerged.

When the World Trade Centre collapsed, Justin Ledingham, 29, who was born in Zimbabwe and later lived in Wales, was working at the Intercontinental Hotel in New York. He was holidaying on the Thai island of Phi Phi when the waves struck.