KOBE -- The United Nations committed itself Saturday to a broad plan of action to reduce the number of deaths caused by natural disasters over the next decade.
But questions remained over whether the collective political will of the member states will be enough to ensure such goals are met.
Delegates to the U.N.-sponsored World Conference on Disaster Reduction ended five days of talks by adopting the Hyogo Framework for Action 2005-2015, which puts priority on establishing disaster reduction policies at both national and local levels and ensuring that technological, logistical and bureaucratic systems are in place to identify, assess and monitor natural disaster risks and enhance early warning abilities.