The Foreign Ministry is calling on the international community to provide more tents to the quake zone.

The Foreign Ministry is calling on the international community to provide more tents to the quake zone.(Photo: xinhua)

Qin Gang, Foreign Ministry Spokesman said According to the latest statistics from the quake-hit areas, we're in urgent need of tents or movable houses because many local people still need them. Their number is very large. We need approximately 3.3 million tents or movable houses. Only 400,000 have been sent to the disaster areas so far.

In addition to tents, the Foreign Ministry is also calling for more donations of satellite phones and other relief materials to Chinese embassies around the world.

The Israeli government has already donated relief materials worth 1.5 million US dollars. The first batch of relief materials reached Beijing from Israel on Thursday. So far, the amount of donation from the international community has reached 2 billion yuan.

(CCTV May 23, 2008)