Most Tsunami Victims Were Women

LAMSENIA, Indonesia — Three times more women than men were killed on average in some tsunami-devastated countries, and the scarcity of women has led to reports of forced marriages and rape, the Britain-based charity Oxfam International said today.

Official statistics do not identify victims by sex, but partial data indicate that most of the more than 280,000 dead and missing in the Dec. 26 disaster were women, especially in Sri Lanka, Indonesia and India.

"In some villages it now appears that up to 80% of those killed were women," said Becky Buel, Oxfam's policy director.

The report concluded that women were less able to outrun the waves or were in their homes when the tsunami hit, while the men were out working.