Press Release No. 062-03
22 February 2003
BODIES
OF 2 FILSEAMEN FROM PANAMANIAN VESSEL FOUND
Two Filipino seamen, members of a 16-man crew that included 12 other Filipinos
and 2 Koreans, lost their lives when the M/V Pendola, the Panamian-registered
lumber carrier they were serving on, foundered in heavy seas off Okinawa
just after midnight February 21st.
The lifeless bodies of James M. SAMPAYAN and Rogelio S. ONOFRE were found
one after another in the late afternoon of the same day by air and sea elements
of the Japanese Maritime Defense Agency.
According to Foreign Secretary Blas F. Ople, who continues to monitor the
case from Malaysia where he is attending the XIII Non-Aligned Meeting in
Kuala Lumpur, the next-of-kin of both men have already been informed.
Meanwhile, the Philippine Embassy in Tokyo, which exercises supervision over
the Honorary Philippine Consulate in Okinawa, has instructions from the DFA
Secretary "… to attend to the needs of the surviving Filipino
crew as well as to facilitate the paperwork needed to bring the remains of
the two fallen seamen home…".
The Embassy is thus working without let-up with the DFA, which has already
identified the (local) manning agent in the Philippines to be Araw Shipping
Agency, Inc., in carrying out Ople's instructions. END