Five members of a Peking University expedition went missing about six days ago when they were trying to conquer the 8,012-meter Mount Shisha Pagma in Tibet, a senior official from China's Mountaineering Federation (CMF) said on Tuesday.

The five students were the first group of a 15-member expedition. They lost contact with the base camp and other groups ever since August 7, Wang Tiemin, vice president of the CMA, told Xinhua on Tuesday.

But Wang Tiemin didn't give the names of the five missing students.

Wang said the CMA had immediately sent rescue teams to Mount Shisha Pagma when it got the report.

(People's Daily August 14, 2002)