The December 26 earthquake off Sumatra, measuring 9.0 on the Richter scale, sent tsunamis sweeping across the Indian Ocean to crash on the shores of India, Indonesia, Maldives, Malaysia, Myanmar and Sri Lanka.

They swept away everyone in their path, from humble fishermen to well-heeled foreign tourists, reduced whole towns to ruins and brought in their wake the threat of killer diseases.

The disaster sparked a massive international aid operation, contributing millions of dollars in cash, emergency supplies and equipment and relief experts.

But United Nations officials said more than 1.6 billion dollars would probably be needed in aid alone, while the total cost was immeasurable and affected countries were expected to take years to recover.

The catastrophe, unprecedented in modern times, also brought calls for a regional tsunami warning system to be set up for the Indian Ocean, similar to the one in the Pacific.

Ironically, several of the countries hit by the waves had escaped the more extreme natural phenomena that pummeled their neighbours earlier in the year.

Incessant monsoon rains, the heaviest in years, had lashed Bangladesh, northeast India and parts of Nepal in July and August, killing at least 1,240 people.

Large swathes of Bangladesh, one of the world's poorest and most densely populated nations, were submerged for weeks. At least 700 people died and many were left homeless.

Powerful storms in the Philippines in early December spawned flash floods and landslides that swept away whole villages, leaving 1,600 dead or missing.

In both cases human activity -- building development in Bangladesh and illegal logging in the Phipippines -- were blamed for worsening the effects of the downpours.

The World Bank estimated the cost to Bangladesh at 2.2 billion dollars this year.

"Farmers have had huge losses and siltation of much land means that many areas will be barren for around 10 years," said Dilruba Haider, assistant representative at the United Nations Development Fund.

Months after the floodwater subsided, aid agencies have described the increased hardship endured by millions already living on less than a dollar a day as a "quiet disaster".

An unusual high pressure system in the Pacific was the main reason for a record 10 typhoons that hit Japan and the heaviest rain in 29 years, the country's Meteorological Agency said.

About 216 people died and damage reached one trillion yen (9.7 billion dollars), government agencies said.

Tokyo is now racing to develop new measures to better warn senior citizens, who accounted for most of the victims, and to improve evacuation orders.

Many elderly were swept away in floods or buried alive in landslides. Of the 93 killed by Typhoon Tokage, the deadliest in 25 years, which struck in October, two-thirds were aged over 60.

Also in October Japan suffered its worst earthquake in a decade, measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale, which killed 40 people.

China suffered too, from floods, typhoons, and the worst drought in more than 50 years which still gripped large parts of the south and east at the end of the year.

More than 1,000 people died in weather-related incidents but the toll was lower than the previous year's figure of 1,900 because of better emergency planning, officials said.

Total economic losses for the year were put at 10 billion dollars.

In Taiwan, massive floods brought by storm Mindulle killed 29 and caused 4.07 billion Taiwan dollars (126 million US) in losses to agriculture and fisheries.

Mudslides triggered by Typhoon Aere in August claimed 15 lives and 767 million dollars in losses, prompting government officals and experts to restrict farming and land use in some conservation and landslide prone areas.

Even before December's overwhelming catastrophe, the United Nations was urging countries to follow Japan's lead in disaster management.

"Too much money is spent tackling the consequences of hazards instead of reducing people's vulnerability in the first place," said Salvano Briceno, director of the UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction secretariat.

In January, officials from about 120 countries will gather in the Japanese city of Kobe -- wrecked by an earthquake in 1995 -- to thrash out life-saving strategies for the future.

The meeting was planned months ago, but its discussions will be sharply focussed by the region's woes.

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