The fourth four-day Disaster Response Exercise and Exchange (Dree), jointly arranged by US Army Pacific and the Armed Forces Division (AFD) Bangladesh began yesterday in the capital with a focus on “earthquake readiness for Dhaka City.”
“Dhaka is now one of the most earthquake-vulnerable cities in the world, while to some extent the same applies for Chittagong and Sylhet as well,” Lieutenant General Abu Belal Mohammad Shafiul Haque, the Principal Staff Officer of the AFD, said at the Dree launching programme at a city hotel yesterday.
The purpose of the exercise has been to discuss and prepare for a disaster, which Bangladesh have not experienced in the last 100 years to a major degree, Shafiul Haque said.
The last two major earthquakes were experienced back in 1885 and 1918, historically known as the Bengal Earthquake and Srimangol Earthquake, respectively.
Shafiul Haque said the government had to address issues like, awareness, preparedness and capacity building.
Meanwhile, the US Ambassador to Bangladesh Dan W Mozena said, three major fault lines criss-cross Bangladesh, and disaster occurrences are not a question of “if” or “what” but “when.”
“It might happen later in the morning, or tomorrow or after a decade,” he said.
A total of 145 participants from 94 stakeholders have been taking part in the exercise.
