A number of Irish people remain unaccounted for following the St Stephen's Day tsunami disaster.
The Department of Foreign Affairs said last night that of more than 2,000 calls made to its emergency helpline since the disaster, "between 10 and 20" cases had not yet been resolved. But a spokeswoman stressed that most of the 700 individuals about whom concerns had been raised were now accounted for successfully. About half the calls to the Department concerned people in Thailand.
She said some families may have called about a potentially missing person and then failed to report subsequent contact.
The Department refused to comment on particular cases, including reports yesterday about two Irish women believed to be missing off the west coast of Thailand.
The Government has doubled its original pledge of €1 million to assist aid agencies working in the parts of south-east Asia worst hit by the disaster.
The Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Mr Conor Lenihan, announced that €2 million would be allocated to the Red Cross and United Nations aid agencies.
Asked on RTÉ radio about the two Irish women, the Irish Ambassador to Thailand and Malaysia, Mr Dan Mulhall, said he wouldn't describe them as missing.
Rather, "we have quite a number of people we still have to trace. Most of those people are probably safe and well, and somewhere out of the danger area. But others may well be still perhaps out in the islands.".
He said about 15 Irish people had received treatment for injuries in hospitals in Phuket. All but two had been discharged.