The Asian Disaster Preparedness Center (ADPC) has fulfilled its design of the tsunami early warning system for the Indian Ocean rim and Southeast Asian countries, local press reported Tuesday.

Speaking at the signing ceremony of the ADPC charter, ADPC's Executive Director Suvit Yodmani said the early warning system is expected to come into operation in two years.

"We are not competing with the others. All we are trying to do is to form a network of early warning centers with countries like India, Indonesia and Japan," Suvit was quoted by the Bangkok Post newspaper as saying.

He added the early warning system plans to address other calamities such as flash floods and typhoons for cost-effectiveness of the system investment.

Some US$50 million are estimated to be needed to upgrade the ADPC into a full-fledged center for information analysis and distribution on tsunami and other national disasters.

The Pathumthani-based ADPC was founded in 1986 with more than 30 members from 11 countries forming its board of trustees.

The system design will be presented at the March 3-8 meeting of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission in Paris.

If India and Indonesia cooperate when building their own systems to link with the ADPC, huge investment required to set up the pressurized censors and buoys as part of the system could be reduced, said Suvit.

According to him, as many as 10 buoys and censors in the Andaman Sea and the Gulf of Thailand may be needed to build the warning system.

Thailand, India and Indonesia have competed with each other in having a regional warning center set up on their own soils ever since the Dec. 26 tsunami disaster which killed at least 280,000 people.

(Xinhua News Agency March 2, 2005)