Relief workers said they were beginning to get through a logjam at wiped-out airstrips to reach a million needy people in the devastated Indonesian province of Aceh.

"Things are improving. The backlog is starting to clear," Michael Elmquist, the chief of the UN's Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Indonesia, told AFP.

The US said it would deploy up to 1,500 marines for tsunami relief in Sri Lanka after sending 17 Navy helicopters to Aceh, some of which were swarmed by hungry survivors.

Ahead of a crisis summit in the Indonesian capital Jakarta on Thursday, countries rushed to outpledge each other with Japan offering 500 million dollars to tsunami victims and Taiwan raising its contribution to 50 million, bringing the total above two billion dollars.

But the massive scale of the human tragedy remains daunting and UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said it could take five to 10 years to reconstruct from the titanic wall of water that tore apart the Indian Ocean coastlines.

In Aceh, which was closest to the epicentre of the December 26 deep-sea tremor which registered 9.0 on the Richter scale, volunteers desperately tried to bury thousands of corpses rotting in tropical temperatures in hopes of curbing the spread of disease.

Agoes Kooshartoro, who leads about 100 Red Crescent volunteers in Aceh, said many others were also suffering disease, particularly of the lungs, after the tsunamis swept away the sanitation infrastructure. "Many people have died because of this."

POSSIBLE OUTBREAKS OF DISEASES
The World Health Organisation said it was also seeing growing reports of potentially deadly diarrhoea outbreaks in displacement camps in Sri Lanka and India.

"It needs a few more days before we can state that we are confident that we've been able to avoid major outbreaks of disease," David Nabarro, the top WHO official dealing with humanitarian crises, told reporters in Geneva.

RESCUERS READY TO CALL OFF SEARCH
AP from Banda Aceh reports: With many thousands still missing, rescuers in the part of Southeast Asia that suffered most from last weekend's earthquake and tsunami stood ready to call off their search for survivors.

Hungry Indonesians welcomed a dozen American Seahawk helicopters as they delivered biscuits, energy drinks and instant noodles to devastated villages on the west coast of Sumatra.

More than 80,000 were killed on the island, and officials say that number could climb past 100,000. No survivor has been found for three days.

"There is very little chance of finding survivors after seven days," Lamsar Sipahutar, the head of Indonesia's search team. "We are about to stop the search-and-rescue operations. If you survived the earthquake, you probably were killed by tsunami."

DEATH COUNTS
AFP reports: Sri Lanka said it had confirmed 29,729 dead from the tidal waves, while more than 16,000 people were injured.

In Thailand the death toll was Sunday revised down slightly to 4,798 as several bodies had been double counted. Some 2,402 foreigners were listed among those who died, official data showed.

The exact toll, however, will likely never be known, with the United Nations saying the number of people killed may be around 150,000.

DISASTER RELIEF SUMMIT
US Secretary of State Colin Powell is due to head to the region to take part in the Jakarta disaster relief summit which will also include Annan, Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi and Australian Prime Minister John Howard.

But Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra of Thailand, another hard-hit country, said Sunday without explanation that he may not attend the Jakarta summit as he went on a new tour of the devastated resort island of Phuket.

France, meanwhile, said it would co-ordinate all European relief efforts for the tsunamis.

Annan, speaking on the US network ABC, said he had not spoken since the disaster to US President George W. Bush amid speculation of a rift over whether the UN or Washington would spearhead the monumental aid effort.

"I've spoken to other leaders around the world, including the Chinese, and they all want to accept the UN leadership and they want to work with us," Annan said.

EC COMMITS 23M EURO
BSS from Dhaka reports: The European Commission has committed 23 million euro to three tsunami-hit countries and is considering to channel more 70 million euro as humanitarian aid to Sri Lanka, the Maldives and Indonesia.

"The commission has already committed 23 million euro for the crisis. And there is reserve of more than 70 million in the ECHO budget to respond to the emergencies," Louis Michel, EU commissioner for development and humanitarian aid said.

AID OPERATIONS
AP reports from Banda Aceh; Elephants were brought in to help remove debris in the ruined provincial capital of Banda Aceh and in southern Thailand, where resorts were destroyed and thousands killed along a world-famous tourist strip near Phuket island.

The American military was mounting its largest operation in southern Asian since the Vietnam War, delivering supplies from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln stationed off Sumatra and sending a flotilla of Marines and water purifying equipment to Sri Lanka.