In Thailand, Director Nitinai Sornsongkram of the Thai Tsunami Victim Identification and Repatriation Centre in southern Phangnga province said 388 bodies of tsunami victims remain unidentified.Phangnga, just north of Phuket province, is the site of the Khao Lak tourist area, where ten of thousands of Europeans spent their winter vacation prior to the 2004 tsunami, which killed about 180,000 on the Indian Ocean rim.
The centre received 3,696 bodies in February 2005 and 3,308 bodies were unidentified and retrieved by their relatives, he said.
He affirmed that agency workers are still trying to identify the bodies and to return them to their families.
At present, there are 445 still missing persons who have been reported by their relatives. Of these, 290 are Thais, 95 are Burmese migrant workers and 60 are Scandinavians.
Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka, and Thailand were all hard hit by the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami triggered by an earthquake with a magnitude of about nine on the Richter scale.
More than 5,000 people, mostly international tourists on holiday, were killed when the killer waves struck Thailand's six Andaman coastal provinces.
- Asian Tribune -
No comments:
Post a Comment