``There Is No Korean Victim``

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) announced yesterday that there were no Korean victims in the airplane crash near the J. F. Kennedy International Airport, New York.

The head office of emergency measures under the MFAT said, ``The Korean Consulate General in New York requested the American Airlines to confirm whether or not there were passengers with 8 different kinds of last name such as Kim, Lee and Park, and received the answer that there was no passenger with such a name.`` ``The Korean Embassy in Dominican Republic, that was the destination of the crashed plane, also examined the Korean residents, but it found that there was neither missing person nor passenger in the crashed plane.`` added the MFAT. Hence, the MFAT decided not to take any emergency measure with regard to this accident.

No Korean boarded in the A300 airplane of the American Airlines, which crashed down in New York on 12th.

When the plane fell, the Korean Consulate General in New York and the Korean Embassy in Dominican Republic worried about the possibility of Korean passengers boarding in the crashed plane, because there are many overseas Korean residents and the workers of the investment companies who export the sewing products to the Dominican Republic.

Often 2 or 3 Korean people board on the plane for Santo Domingo (capital city). But Mr. Yang Gook-Bo, a trade official at the Dominican Republic of the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA), said, ``Fortunately, the overseas Korean residents and the workers of the investment companies, who had scheduled to arrive at Santo Domingo on 12th, booked the plane departing on 13th or other dates because of the personal reasons.``

About 200 Korean people (100 permanent residents and 100 temporary residing workers) live in the Dominican Republic. Most of them are engaged in producing the sewing goods including knitwears and hats in a free trade area `Sona Franca`, in order to export to the United States and other countries.

taylor55@donga.com