Death toll crosses 1,75,000

A senior international aid official said Indonesia’s Aceh province was rebounding so well from the disaster that emergency relief work could wind up fairly quickly. ‘‘I think we are fortunate that things are not as bad as we feared,’’ said Patrick Webb, Chief of nutrition at the United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP). ‘‘Malnutrition is not widespread. Diseases are not rampant yet,’’ he said in Banda Aceh.

Sri Lankan officials said another 7,275 people were now known to have died in the Dec. 26 catastrophe, taking the national total to 38,195. The jump was not due to the sudden discovery of a large number of bodies, but because of a backlog of figures from remote areas.

In a lightning visit to a small village in Galle, in southern Sri Lanka, US Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said “the whole world wants to help you, my country especially.’’

Sri Lanka announced a major reconstruction drive to build 15 new towns on its southern and eastern coasts. The government will help people rebuild in safe areas, or simply construct new towns. Some Sri Lankans were already rebuilding, defying a government ban to put up houses and hotels close to the shore.

Denmark’s foreign ministry warned of possible attacks on foreign aid workers in Aceh, where separatist rebels have been engaged in a conflict with government troops.

But from a hideout on the edge of a jungle outside Banda Aceh, rebel commander Tengku Mucksalmina said: ‘‘Our mothers, our wives, our children are victims from this tragedy.

We would never ambush any convoy with aid for them. We want them (aid groups) to stay. We ask them not to leave the Acehnese people who are suffering.”