Head of the Jembrana Population Verification, Workforce and Transmigration Office Dede Heryady said here Thursday that the migrant workers` families were expected to remain calm.
They need not believe in rumors and baseless information on the fate of the 175 Jembrana workers in Japan, he said.
"The Jembrana residents taking an internship program are not only taken care of by the Jembrana district government but also the ministry for workforce and transmigration," he said.
They were also taken care of by the Indonesian embassy and Tsukuba cooperative, where they were taking the internship program, he said.
The deep concern of parents and relatives of the Indonesians living in Japan is understandable because the earthquake and tsunami that struck that country on March 11 had killed thousands of people.
Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa even hinted that the fate and whereabouts of 139 Indonesians in Japan were still uncertain.
"The number of Indonesians whose whereabouts cannot yet be confirmed totaled 139 people," he told journalists at the Presidential Palace in Jakarta on Thursday.
The number of Indonesians still unaccounted for had decreased from 160 on the previous day. "Their number is believed to keep decreasing," Marty Natalegawa said.
About the impact of the leaking nuclear power plant, he said the Indonesian embassy had been ordered to evacuate Indonesians to locations 50 kilometers from the danger zone.
The devastating earthquake with its subsequent deadly tsunami on March 11 had reportedly killed at least 5,000 people and caused almost 10,000 others go missing.
CNN quoted a Tokyo resident as saying on Thursday that food shortages were spreading in the capital city and Japanese forces kept trying to control the nuclear plant crisis by dropping water from helicopters.
As a result of its nuclear plant crisis, Japan has asked Indonesia to increase its liquefied natural gas (LNG) supplies to help the country deal with the crisis.
Japanese Deputy Foreign Minister Makiko Kikuta met with Indonesian Coordinating Minister for Economy Hatta Rajasa in Jakarta on Thursday.(*)
Editor: Aditia Maruli Radja
Copyright © ANTARA 2011
