LA PAZ —

Japanese Embassy officials in Bolivia continued work Friday to confirm the identity of the five Japanese tourists who were killed Thursday in a car accident near the Salar de Uyuni salt desert in the mid-western part of the country. According to the Foreign Ministry, the five are believed to be Keigo Ishikawa, 66, from Tokyo, Fumiko Koiwa, 38, from Yokohama, Naoyuki Yasuda, 51, from Yokohama, Akemi Yasuda, 40, from Yokohama and Eriko Kashima, 30, from Chiba Prefecture.

The bodies of the five Japanese victims were carried to a funeral services company in the Bolivian capital of La Paz on Friday. A car carrying the five, believed to be on their way to Salar de Uyuni, the world’s largest salt flat, crashed head-on with another car carrying Israeli tourists. Israeli media reported that five Israelis were killed. Both vehicles went up in flames.

© 2008 Kyodo News. All rights reserved. No reproduction or republication without written permission.

4 Comments

• 

  rjd_jr at 07:15 AM JST - 3rd May

  Sad, rest in peace.

• 

  romulus3 at 08:28 AM JST - 3rd May

  wow...must have been carnage out there. Israelis getting away from their stressful lives on the front lines and Japanese escaping the slavery of their world to enjoy beautiful Bolivia. Well at least they died in heaven, not hell.

• 

  borscht at 07:31 PM JST - 3rd May

  It's a shame the two groups met such a disaster while traveling. Or at any time, but vacation time is a bad time to die.

  By the way, does anyone know if your governments will try to identify you if you have an accident in another country? Say, for example, you go somewhere during Golden Week and die in a traffic accident; will your government rush to identify you?

• 

  colasan at 09:39 PM JST - 8th May

  Eriko Kashima was one of my students....what a shock!!!

Register or login to add a comment!