ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that since disasters observe no boundaries, its legal framework too should be all-encompassing, inclusive of varying cultural demands and broad based in its observance. Notwithstanding the fact that most of the hotspots of disasters are generally at the international boundaries of hills, mountains, rivers and oceans which remain neglected for lack of civil governance, the insurmountable problems and misunderstandings emerge due to an absence of a legal framework for cooperation, relief sharing and international obligations. Tilakawardane who as a judge in the Supreme Court of Sri Lanka found a patriarchal insulation of international legal framework. By undertaking a critical comparative framework of vulnerability during many international disasters – for example, the 2004 earthquake and subsequently the tsunami in the Indian Ocean, the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, the 2011 Tohuku earthquake till the tsunami in Japan and the 2015 Nepal earthquake, the author suggests that such catastrophes demand gender-sensitive risk assessment and gender-responsive recovery and rehabilitation as integral components of disaster management law.
