ANGELES CITY – South Korean-owned Hanjin Heavy Industries and Construction Co. on Wednesday announced it would form a special committee that would monitor compliance of its subcontractors with international safety standards in shipbuilding works.

“We will try to level up safety awareness of all those concerned, including subcontractors, to the extent of international standard. In addition, we will form a special committee to especially monitor and implement safety wise matters,” Pyeong Jong Yu, HHIC-Philippines general manager, said.

Pyeong bared the plan without saying whether the death of two workers on Monday night at Hanjin’s shipyard off the Redondo Bay in Subic, Zambales, was the result of an accident or was due to breaches in safety rules by its Filipino subcontractor, the Globe Distribution Services.

The latest incident brought to five the number of work-related deaths at the South Korean-owned facility since December last year.

A worker died when he fell off a truck driven by a Korean engineer on Dec. 24. Two workers died on Jan. 18 when an explosion occurred from a supposedly leaking oxygen tank. In the March 10 incident, a part of a crane fell on Neil Mojica and Eduardo Molina, killing them instantly.

The labor and ecology departments of the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority, which are investigating the recent deaths, have yet to confirm reports that another worker died after falling off a roof of a building at the shipyard last Tuesday.

A report from the Task Force Hanjin, a citizen’s group monitoring the operation of the company, said the worker, identified as Angelo Banaag, died at the James L. Gordon Hospital while undergoing treatment.

HHIC-Philippines would enforce “stricter training and supervision on hazardous work to minimize recurrence of similar incident, if not preventing [this] completely,” Pyeong said.

“It was and will be our concern that our employees, including subcontractors must be well aware of what is shipbuilding and its incidental activities,” he said.

He said it has been “very difficult for us to find subcontractors satisfying our requirement and expectation.”

The work of Filipino subcontractors, he said, was limited for now to doing loading and unloading of cargoes.

“We are hiring many Filipino companies but when it comes to some work directly related to shipbuilding, Korean subcontractors only are contracted at this time, mainly because we cannot find qualified and experienced local companies,” he said.

HHIC-Philippines has asked Globe Distribution Services to “settle amicably and fairly” with the families of the victims, both residents of Castillejos, Zambales.