Sri Lanka News Updates with Discussions

The tsunami killed more than 200,000 people in 13 countries. At least 128,000 people died in Indonesia alone.

Many months later, bodies were still being discovered in some countries.

There was a massive international response. Six months after the disaster about $12bn (£7bn) around the world had been pledged in aid.

But rebuilding in many of the stricken areas is slow and thousands of people remain homeless due to various reasons including mishandling funds.

The UN has said it expects much of the reconstruction work to take up to five years.

Governments affected by the disaster have built a tsunami early warning system.

The Boxing Day sea surge was triggered when an earthquake caused the sea floor to jolt vertically by about 10m (33ft), which displaced hundreds of cubic kilometres of water.

The resulting waves travelled at speeds of up to 800km/h (497mph).