SINGAPORE : The Foreign Affairs Ministry says more Singaporeans who were reportedly in the the tsunami disaster areas have been contacted.
Those uncontactable now number 51, down from 81 on Sunday.
The number of Singaporeans dead remains at nine, while 12 others are missing, all in Thailand.
At the same briefing, it was announced that the United Nations has accepted Singapore's offer to set up a UN Regional Coordination Centre here to coordinate relief efforts to stricken areas.
Singapore has sent humanitarian aid and disaster relief teams to the tsunami-stricken areas, and it is set to play a larger role when the UN Regional Coordination Centre is set up in the days ahead.
This centre will see an influx of UN staff and it is likely to be a long-term infrastructure to help reconstruction efforts.
Said Andrew Tan of the MFA, "We're glad that the UN has accepted our offer, it will give us a greater role in helping to relieve the congestion that is now building up in many of these areas .... The key right now is to make sure this aid gets down to the people in the remote areas so that public health disaster can be averted."
The Singapore government had earlier announced it was opening its air and naval bases as additional staging and logistics points for bringing relief supplies to Indonesia.
John Budd, UNICEF head of communications in Indonesia, said, "The Singapore government's military response to the emergency in Aceh has been nothing less than outstanding. It has done a phenomenal job; all the aid agencies and the UN are very grateful for the enormous and fast response the military in Singapore brought to bear on this disaster."
The Foreign Ministry has also made headway in contact tracing.
The police have also been making home visits to those listed as uncontactable to check if they have returned.
MFA's Benjamin William said, "The new school term has started; that has help us to bring down the uncontactable figure significantly over the last two days. More and more Singaporeans returned, we've managed to contact them, some did not even realise that friends and families have reported them as uncontactable."
DNA samples for 11 of the 12 missing persons have been collected. The police say they also have samples for two persons from the uncontactable list.
The civil defence also clarified that reports that two Singaporean boys had died dead in the Aceh province are inaccurate, as seven bodies, all adults, were found in the wreckage.
The search operation was called off on Sunday night. - CNA
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