Jiang Expresses Condolence Over Victims of China Airlines Crash

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, May 28, 2002

Jiang Expresses Condolence Over Victims of China Airlines Crash

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President Jiang Zemin on Monday expressed condolence over the losses of lives in the crash of the China Airlines Flight CI-611 off the island county of Penghu, and asked relevant departments to make their all-out efforts to help the rescue work and properly deal with the aftermath of the accident.

Jiang said that he is highly concerned with the tragedy when meeting representatives of the 11th national civil affairs conference. Compatriots across the Taiwan straits are bound together by ties of brotherly love. "I express my condolence over the compatriots from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Chinese Mainland, who were killed in the tragedy and show my sincere sympathy to their relatives".

With 206 passengers and 19 crew members on board, the passenger jet belonging to the Taiwan-based China Airlines crashed into the sea off the Penghu Islands en route from Taipei to Hong Kong Saturday afternoon.

Mainland Ships Retrieve Six Pieces of Crashed Plane

Rescue ships sent by China's Ministry of Communications to aid rescue work of the crashed Taiwan China Airlines passenger plane have salvaged six pieces of wreckage in the Taiwan Strait by Monday evening.

Meanwhile, a mainland fishing boat retrieved a dead body from the air crash Monday morning and handed it to a patrol ship of Taiwan. This was the only dead body recovered in Monday's rescue and salvage operations.

Three relatives of a mainland victim from Fujian Province had arrived at Taipei's Taoyuan airport by 7:00 p.m. Another seven left Guilin Monday night for Taipei via Hong Kong.

A total of 35 family members of the mainland victims are expected to fly to Taiwan.

Crash Victims' Relatives Ask for Joint Search with Mainland

Relatives of victims of the airline crash in the Taiwan Straits are demanding that Taiwan officials work with Chinese mainland counterparts in speeding up the recovery of bodies and debris.

Although more staff and equipment have joined the rescue team since the operation began on Saturday immediately after the crash which killed 225 passengers and crew, only about one-third of the victims have been found.

Relatives of victims who went to the island of Penghu to collect their remains argued with the rescue team this morning.

Taiwan's China Airlines, which owned the crashed Boeing 747-200aircraft, has forbidden reporters to enter the reception room for victims' relatives.

One family member told Xinhua indignantly, "We have complaints,but no way to speak out."

Hearing that some bodies might sink with parts of the jet and not be found, "all of us become more worried", said the relative who declined to give his name.

Some said that they could not understand why the Taiwan authorities had not resolved to ask for help from all sources until the third day.

Helicopters and rescue workers from Hong Kong were ready to offer help, but were rejected by Taiwan. They were told that Taiwan did not need assistance and returned to Hong Kong.

One man asked the head of Taiwan's communications department, "My father was going to northeast China. How come he died at Penghu?Why don't we have direct transportation with the mainland?"

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