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A Government spokesman said as at 12 noon today (January 5), the Immigration Department's hotline (2829 3010) had received 877 enquiries and 1 362 requests for assistance.

Meanwhile, there remained 62 cases in which the callers were able to provide the personal particulars of the residents concerned as well as some information about their last known locations. Amongst them, 34 were reported to be in Thailand, 11 in Indonesia, one in Malaysia, and 16 in other places. There were no reported cases involving Hong Kong residents in Sri Lanka and Maldives.

In addition, there also remained 352 Hong Kong residents whose family members have not provided the personal particulars or specific information on the last known locations of these residents. The Immigration Department is liaising with the caller in each of these cases to gather the required information for immediate follow-up actions.

As regards casualties involving Hong Kong residents, the Government received a new report on death toll involving a woman in Sri Lanka. This brought the fatalities to nine in total. The support team also located a Hong Kong resident in a hospital in Phuket today. So far, six people including two men, three women and a girl are still hospitalized in Thailand.

Among the 58 students reported to have lost contact with their schools yesterday, 57 were found to be either in Hong Kong or in countries not hit by the tsunamis. One student was found to be safely in Thailand. Another six students were reported to have lost contact with their schools today. The Police were following up these cases promptly.

On the multi-disciplinary support team from the HKSAR Government, the spokesman noted that in view of a decreased demand for services required of the support team, the deployment of Hong Kong's support team in Thailand would be adjusted accordingly, although all essential services would continue.

Starting from today, the help desks set up in Phuket and Bangkok International Airport would operate at busy hours only. The multi-disciplinary support team would also maintain its presence in hospitals where Hong Kong residents are staying.

The three telephone hotlines would continue to operate round the clock to provide assistance to Hong Kong residents. They are: 096471215 and 096471208 (for calling from Thailand) or Hong Kong number (852) 9038 6578.

Local Hong Kong residents are urged to call the Immigration Department's hotline at 2829 3010, if necessary.

On the DNA database set up by the Thai authorities to help verify the identity of victims in the disaster, the spokesman said that Hong Kong Police continued to contact relatives of unlocated Hong Kong people for the collection of DNA samples. Police had so far taken samples from 22 family members of the victims.

As part of the procedure, oral swap and hair samples will be taken at Central Police Station at Arsenal Street, Wan Chai.

A dedicated web page containing information on the tsunamis can be accessed through a hyperlink at the Government's homepage (www.info.gov.hk) or the Immigration Department's homepage (www.immd.gov.hk). The total page view up to January 4 stood at 1 010 997.

The web page provides, with the consent of families concerned, information on the personal particulars of Hong Kong residents reported to have lost contact with their families. Hyperlinks were also established with the dedicated websites of Thai Government and Red Cross on the tsunamis.

The spokesman also advised the public to beware of suspected fraud e-mails soliciting donations to help South Asian people affected by the tsunamis. Reports on such mails can be made to the Police at 2860 5012.

Ends/Wednesday, January 5, 2005

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