Asia-Pacific

One saved from Indonesian boat

By Cheng Guangjin (China Daily)
Updated: 2010-02-02 08:36

One of the 24 Chinese passengers on board a boat that sank in Indonesia waters last Wednesday was rescued, the Chinese embassy in Indonesia confirmed yesterday.

The speedboat, Dolphin, was carrying 33 people, including 24 Chinese.

The rescued passenger was sent to a local hospital for treatment, a secretary of the embassy surnamed Zang told China Daily.

Chinese passengers were among five corpses retrieved from the water by the local search and rescue team, but the number and identities have not been confirmed yet, according to Zang.

The speedboat sank near the Aru Islands, east of Indonesia, in the afternoon of Jan 27 in stormy waves, according to the statement on the website of the Chinese embassy in Indonesia.

Head of operations of the Maluccas rescue team Amin Bintongke told Xinhua News Agency over the phone on Sunday that besides the 24 Chinese, 5 were crew members, and the others were unidentified passengers.

"The boat sank at midday, one hour after it left a port at Dobo in Aru Islands heading to Tual in southeast Maluccas," Amin said.

After hearing of the accident yesterday, the Chinese embassy requested the Indonesian navy search and rescue agencies to go all out to rescue the missing Chinese passengers.

Poor weather has been blamed for the accident, as the country's meteorology and Geophysics Agency had issued a warning not to sail in the preceding days, Xinhua said.

"It seems that the boat ignored the warning. It departed from an old harbor in Dobo, but actually it should have left from an official harbor with permission," said Amin. "The passengers seemed to have forced the boat to sail, as they had urgent business."

Search and rescue work is still underway, in spite of the bad weather here, he said.

According to Antara news agency, the 24 Chinese victims were employed by a local company PT. Arabika Jaya Tama to build a factory in Penambulai island.