Eight Taiwanese are believed to be missing in New York City in the wake of the terrorist attack on Tuesday at the World Trade Center, according to Taiwan's top representative in New York.
The number of Taiwanese missing increased overnight Tuesday.
Staff at the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in New York stayed up throughout Tuesday night and into the early hours yesterday to take calls flooding in from the US and Taiwan from friends and relatives concerned for the safety of their loved ones, Hsia said.
According to Katharine Chang (張小月), a spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), four of the missing have been identified as Chien Huei-ta (簡慧達), Li Yang-te (李洋德), Chang Mei-ching (張美欽) and Wang Ching-huei (王晴暉).
Chu Ming-ching (朱明津), manager of the First Commercial Bank branch office located at the World Trade Center, confirmed with Hsia's office at 7:30pm on Tuesday that his colleagues Chang and Wang could not be found, according to a Taiwanese diplomat surnamed Chen in the office.
Chang and Wang were, however, hired locally rather than having been transferred from Taiwan. Their exact nationality was as of press time still unclear.
Chien and Li are employees of two US firms also located in the building, MOFA's Chang said.
The China Times Express reported that a Taiwanese volunteer working for the Tzu Chi Buddhist foundation, who also worked at the World Trade Center, called his wife to say farewell after realizing he would be unable to escape from the disaster.
Hsia said the office is still checking the validity of that report.
The foreign ministry also announced that Taiwan's national day celebrations in the US scheduled for Oct. 10 would be cancelled.
Minister of Foreign Affairs Tien Hung-mao (田弘茂) said the ministry would not issue a travel warning to citizens of Taiwan, unlike its counterpart in Japan, which had advised Japanese not to travel to the US for at least a week.
Tien also said it was too early to comment on the likely impact on Taiwan of a possible military retaliation by the US against the aggressors.
But the minister added: "I believe in view of the good ties between the US and our government recently, maybe a consultation opportunity prior to the move would occur."
The ministry also confirmed the safety of Taiwan's politicians currently in the US, including Premier Chang Chun-hsiung (
In related news, the American Institute in Taiwan in a statement said: "There is no known threat to American citizens and facilities in Taiwan."
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