Locsin rejects call to ask Asian powers to join search for missing crewmen

Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin on Friday rejected a call for the Philippine government to ask Australia and New Zealand to join in the search operations for the missing Filipino crewmen of a cargo vessel that sank off Japan more than two weeks ago.

"I refuse to ask other Asian powers to join in the search because that is an attack on the sovereignty of Japan," Locsin said in response to a letter sent by Senator Risa Hontiveros.

In her letter dated Sept. 16, Hontiveros asked Locsin to persuade Japan to expand its search and rescue efforts

En route to Port of Jingtang in Tangshan, the ship Gulf Livestock 1, carrying 43 crewmen, including 39 Filipinos, was able make a distress call on Sept. 2 from Amami Oshima Island in Kagoshima Prefecture before it sank as Typhoon Maysak lashed the area with strong winds and heavy seas.

Aside from Filipinos, sailors from New Zealand and Australia were on board the ship.

So far, only two crewmen — both Filipinos — have been rescued, while another was pronounced dead.

Rescue efforts have been on and off due to bad weather the past few days.

Locsin said the Japanese government did not cease its search and "had in fact continued it against protocol."

The families of the missing crewmen in a news conference called on Japanese authorities to resume its search and expand it to waters off South Korea and Taiwan. —KBK, GMA News