Korean government offers assistance to Taiwan after earthquake

Social Affairs

Published: 04 Apr. 2024, 18:28 Updated: 04 Apr. 2024, 19:46

Korean government offers assistance to Taiwan after earthquake

Forklifts and cranes are being deployed to demolish collapsed buildings in Hualien, an eastern town in Taiwan, as a 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck Wednesday morning. [SHIN KYUNG-JIN]

The Korean government on Thursday expressed willingness to provide necessary assistance to Taiwan, conveying condolences for the damages suffered from the 7.4-magnitude earthquake that struck Wednesday.

Assistance for natural disasters such as earthquakes is usually negotiated depending on a foreign government's request, but Taiwan has yet to make any.

“We are heartbroken for the lost lives and damages that Taiwan suffered from the earthquake,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lim Soo-suk said Thursday during a regular press briefing. “We express our deepest sympathies to the victims, their bereaved families and the injured. We hope that the pain and difficulties caused by the disaster will be overcome soon, and stand ready to provide necessary support for disaster relief and recovery.”

Regarding the six Korean travelers who were stranded in the eastern town of Hualien, the region where the earthquake struck hardest, Lim said that the briefly stranded nationals “have been safely moved to a stable area.”

With ten deaths and more than 1,058 injured as of Thursday afternoon, no Korean casualties were reported, the Foreign Ministry said.

The 7.4-magnitude earthquake struck the eastern part of Taiwan around 7 a.m. Wednesday and was followed by more than 300 cases of aftershocks, according to the Taiwanese authorities. This earthquake is the strongest since the 7.6-magnitude earthquake that hit on Sept. 21, 1999, which killed more than 2,000 people on the island.

Of the ten deaths, four died in Taroko National Park, a popular tourist destination, two in a tunnel rest area, one in an expressway parking lot, one in a mining area, one in a building in downtown Hualien and one also in the Hualien area.

The total number of people stranded in collapsed buildings stood at 646 as of Thursday.

Taiwanese authorities are focused on searching for missing and buried people in collapsed buildings, especially in Hualien County.

Rescue efforts are not expected to be easy as more aftershocks are likely to strike for another two or three days.

BY LIM JEONG-WON [lim.jeongwon@joongang.co.kr]