Asia-Pacific News
Japan to send medical experts to quake-hit China
May 19, 2008, 8:15 GMT
Tokyo - Japan might pull out its rescue team from China's earthquake-hit Sichuan province and send medical experts instead, media reports said Monday.
The 60-member rescue team that arrived in China Friday might return home because chances of finding survivors are limited now that a week has passed since the May 12 magnitude-8 earthquake.
Chief Cabinet Secretary said Japan decided to send in 20 medical professionals as early as Tuesday after the quake killed an estimated more than 50,000 people and displaced nearly 5 million. About 14,000 people were believed to be buried under collapsed buildings.
'A week has passed since the earthquake, and I think it is about time to consider the future operation [of the relief team],' the top government spokesman said at a press conference.
Japanese rescue workers - including firefighters, police, Coast Guard staff and Foreign Ministry officials - arrived in south-western China Friday, becoming the first foreign relief workers to arrive there since the quake.
They have conducted rescue work using rescue dogs, scopes and drilling machines.
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