Clinton visits quake-hit Chile

Clinton, who flew here from Buenos Aires, told reporters on Monday that she was bringing 20 satellite phones as an initial US contribution.

SANTIAGO, March 2, 2010 (AFP) - US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton brought satellite phones and offers of further assistance to quake-struck Chile on Tuesday and hugged Chilean President Michelle Bachelet on arrival.

"We brought some satellite phones. That was the one thing we could get on the plane right away," Clinton told Bachelet in a special reception area at Santiago airport as the pair embraced and clasped hands.

Bachelet said earlier Tuesday that she was increasing to 14,000 the number of troops in the disaster zone after reports of rampant looting and widespread insecurity in the aftermath of the quake.

Clinton, who flew here from Buenos Aires, told reporters on Monday that she was bringing 20 satellite phones as an initial US contribution to relief efforts in the aftermath of Saturday's 8.8 magnitude quake.

"One of their biggest problems has been communications," Clinton, who was also meeting Bachelet's successor in two weeks time, Sebastian Pinera, told reporters on the plane earlier in her six-country Latin American tour.

"They can't communicate into Concepcion and some of the surrounding areas," she said, referring to Chile's worst hit second city. "They've been blocked getting into some remote areas."

Clinton said US search and rescue teams were on standby, while the State Department in Washington ramped up other assistance efforts.

"Chile has requested our help in terms of providing a field hospital, communications support, and water purification systems. And so we are mobilizing those capabilities as we speak and will be moving those down to Chile as quickly as possible," spokesman Philip Crowley told reporters.

Crowley said an estimated 18,000 Americans were in Chile at the time of the disaster, but that he had not heard of any US fatalities.

Aid pledges poured into Chile from around the world Monday after the government made its first requests for help as the rising death toll from the devastating earthquake reached 723.

Bachelet specifically requested mobile bridges, field hospitals, satellite phones, electrical generators, disaster assessment and coordination teams, water purification systems, field kitchens and restaurants, UN officials said.

Some two million Chileans, or one eighth of the entire population, are estimated to have been affected by Saturday's massive temblor, which along with an Ecuador quake in 1906 is the seventh most powerful on record.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva became the first foreign leader to visit quake-hit Chile on Monday, after learning the damage -- much of it on the coast from a massive tsunami -- was far worse than feared.

The quake comes six weeks after a massive temblor flattened the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince and forced Clinton to call off an Asian tour when she was in Hawaii.

On January 17, Clinton made a brief visit to Port-au-Prince airport to consult with Haitian President Rene Preval, five days after the quake struck and killed more than 220,000 people in the impoverished Caribbean country.