On the establishment of a disaster early-warning mechanism, the Chinese premier said the latest catastrophe has highlighted the extreme importance of a tsunami early warning mechanism. China will invite experts from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), India, Sri Lanka, Maldives, and relevant international organizations to a China-ASEAN Workshop on Tsunami Warning scheduled for Jan. 25-26 in Beijing, the premier said.

    The Chinese government is ready to help the neighboring countries, the afflicted countries in particular, to establish an earthquake monitoring and tsunami early-warning network with a view to exchanging and evaluating information in good time and forecasting and preventing earthquakes, tsunamis and other natural disasters, Wen added.

    He also expressed China's readiness to share relevant data and products of its Fengyun-2 satellite with the countries in the region, and to provide them with information and technical backup on weather forecasting, environment monitoring and disaster assessment.

    "I propose that a 10+1 seminar on post-disaster disease prevention be held under the China-ASEAN Fund for Public Health," he said, adding China is willing to host an Asian conference on Disaster Reduction and looks forward to discussing with ASEAN and South Asian countries on the signing of bilateral or multilateral disaster reduction agreements and the cooperation for human resources development.

    In addition, China is ready to finance experience sharing and training projects in disaster prevention, disaster relief and post-disaster reconstruction, Wen said.

    "We propose that disaster reduction, disaster prevention and disaster relief be listed as a key priority area for China-ASEAN cooperation, ASEAN plus China, Japan and ROK (South Korea) cooperation, as well as Asian Cooperation Dialogue in the interest of closer cooperation on disaster control at the regional level," he said.

    "We highly appreciate the efforts made by the UN and the international community in assisting the afflicted countries, support the leadership and coordination by the UN and the World Health Organization in offering humanitarian assistance, and pay high tribute to the primary role played by ASEAN," he pointed out.