The PR spoke with the Secretary of State for the Portuguese Communities, Paulo Cafôfo, and received information from the Consul General in San Francisco, Pedro Pinto, about fires in Hawaii.
The President of the Republic, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa, said this Saturday that “there is no news of Portuguese citizens” among the fatalities of the forest fires in Hawaii, United States.
“There is no news from Portuguese citizens. (…) Apparently, there is no Portuguese name on the available lists”, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa told reporters in Faro, before the Portugal-United States match, in preparation for the 2023 France rugby world cup.
The President of the Republic explained that he spoke with the Secretary of State for the Portuguese Communities, Paulo Cafôfo, and that he received information from the Consul General in San Francisco, Pedro Pinto.
“In the available lists, apparently, no Portuguese name appears, but there is a feeling that among the missing there may be some descendants of those remote generations” of Portuguese who emigrated to that archipelago, he admitted.
The Department of Foreign Affairs confirmed today that descendants of Portuguese have disappeared after the forest fires in Hawaii, which caused the death of at least 80 people.
The Portuguese government guaranteed that it was following the situation through the Portuguese Consulate General in San Francisco, and was also in contact with the leaders of the Portuguese community in Hawaii.
The fires hit the North American island of Maui, in the Hawaiian archipelago, and according to local authorities, some 1,418 people were transferred to shelters.
Source: Observadora
