At first, we express our sincere condolences to the affected and victims of the Great East Japan Earthquake on Mar. 11, the Eastern Turkey Earthquake on Oct. 23 and so on. We very much appreciate your understanding and continuous support. This year, new staff members, Dr. Morita and Dr. Ishihara joined IISEE. We would like to greet all of you to see the New Year in with happiness. (See photos of all staff members) We sincerely hope that next year we will have no earthquake and no tsunami disaster in the world.

Shoichi ANDO & all IISEE staff members

We are conducting a contact information survey of ex-participants of IISEE / BRI that have exceeded more than 1500 persons up to this year. We are sending e-mails to those who have informed e-mail address to IISEE with a table of ex-participants of each country and asking to fill in and revise. We sincerely ask your favor when you receive the request.

IISEE

The International Institute of Seismology and Earthquake Engineering of the Building Research Institute has been providing the "Global Seismological Observation Course" since 1995 in cooperation with the Japan International Cooperation Agency and the Japan Meteorological Agency. The course aims at capacity buildings on technologies related to detection/discrimination of nuclear tests utilizing seismological observations. This course is an international contribution to the nuclear disarmament. IISEE has trained 160 participants from 69 countries and has been highly appreciated in the fields of Japanese international cooperation and technical assistance. The 17th course will start on January 12, 2012 and end on March 8. The IISEE will have 10 participants from 10 countries, which are (in alphabetical order) Egypt, Fiji, Guatemala, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Turkmenistan and Zimbabwe.

Hajime KUROSAWA
Head of Administration Division, IISEE

Tatsuhiko HARA
Chief Research Scientist, IISEE

IISEE puts photos of tsunami affected areas where participants visited last month as informed in the last newsletter with the former photos that were taken from the same location in order to compare the damage and reconstruction status in the following website. (Photos taken from famous 10m height seawall in Taro area, Miyako city, Iwate)
http://iisee/special2/20110311/PPTs_beforeafter_modified20111214.pdf
In addition, both participants of 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 have heard a quite impressive poem from a local resident in Minami-Sanriku Town, and IISEE translated into English as attached under the recognition. (The poem "Dark Forest" was composed by a family of priest of Shinto shrine in Minami-Sanriku Town.)

Shoichi ANDO
Director, IISEE

Last September, 20 participants of the 2010-2011 course from 10 countries completed their Master Papers and were awarded master's degree in Disaster Management. In the following website, the synopses of their Master Papers have been added.
Website: http://iisee.kenken.go.jp/syndb/
Please visit this page and read the synopsis of the fruitful work of each participant.

Hajime KUROSAWA
Head of Administration Division, IISEE