Five killed after tsunami hits Indonesia

Five people were killed when waves hit buildings on the south coast of Indonesia's Java island Monday after a strong undersea quake triggered a tsunami alert, Indonesia's president said.

An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.2 triggered a tsunami warning earlier in the day on Monday on Indonesia's Java and Sumatra islands and Australia's Christmas and Cocos islands, tsunami and meteorological agencies said.

The earthquake, which hit at 3:24 p.m. (0824 GMT) caused tall buildings to sway in the Indonesian capital and at least one other city on Java Island for around two minutes, witnesses said.

Indonesia is prone to earthquakes because of its location on the so-called Pacific "Ring of Fire," an arc of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.

A massive 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami killed at least 216,000 people - nearly half of them in Indonesia's Aceh province.

On May 27, a magnitude-5.9 earthquake devastated a large swath of Java Island, killing more than 5,800 people.