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Flags flew at half mast in Indonesia’s Aceh province and residents gathered at the mass graves on Thursday, as the province commemorated nine years since the tsunami that devastated the region and affected the coastal areas across South and South-East Asia.
About 170,000 people died in Aceh, a province on the northern tip of Sumatra island which bore the brunt of the tsunami. Families who lost their loved ones offered prayers and recited Koranic verses.
“It’s been nine years but it feels like it was yesterday,” said 50-year-old Makmun Adam, who lost two children and his wife in the tsunami.
“I pray to God that they be given a place in heaven,” he said.
Indonesian red-and-white flags will be flown at half mast for three days to mark the disaster.
The tsunami was triggered by a magnitude-9.3 earthquake off Sumatra, and killed an estimated 230,000 people in 13 countries on the Indian Ocean.
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