Tribute to 'outstanding' daughter

The parents of Potters Bar rail crash victim Chia Hsin Lin have spoken of their "kind and giving" daughter.

The 30-year-old had been living in London since August, studying for an MA in Communication Studies at City University. Her parents, Chiu Kuei-Chih and Lin Chen-Fa, her sister Lin Chia-Hui and brother Lin Chia-Liang have flown to Britain from their home in Taiwan to join her boyfriend of 18 months, Jorge Tseng.

In a statement, her parents said: "Our daughter was so kind and giving, she was a great support to her family and always put our needs before her own. A talented student, she had a promising career ahead of her. She had already been successful in her television work. It will be so hard for us to come to terms with her death.

"She was very good to us and had a very big heart. She had sponsored an orphan in Thailand and was always very quick to give herself to other people."

Miss Lin, the eldest of three children, graduated from Chengchi University in Taiwan after studying for a journalism degree. She went to work in radio before securing a job with the Taiwanese television station, TVBS, and later worked on the Chinese Television Network.

Mr Tseng said: "She was a warm and caring person and always had time to help other people. She was very popular and was out with her friends enjoying life when the accident happened. I will miss her so very much."

The fiance of Chia Chin Wu, the friend who died alongside Miss Lin, paid tribute to the woman he had planned to marry next year.

Al Go, who works for the Reuters news agency in Beijing, said: "She was so happy to be in London visiting-with her best friends and had made plans for a great trip. In her work she was straight talking, sincere, direct and professional.

"She was a well-known journalist and was respected by her peers. She had an excellent eye for detail and could find interesting stories out of seemingly mundane and everyday things.

"Privately she was a very warm, caring person who enjoyed travelling. You would always find her with a book in her hands, she loved reading. We would often discuss things about what we read late into the night.

"We were intending to get married some time next year and had made so many plans for travelling and our future life together. I am still finding it so hard to believe she has left us."

Miss Wu, 30, had worked as a broadcast journalist for TVBS for nearly three years. She divided her time between Shanghai in China and Taiwan's capital Taipei, covering news issues and business reporting.

Miss Wu had a degree in Political Science from Taiwan University and two MA degrees in Media Studies from Boston University.

At the time of the crash Ms Lin and Miss Wu were travelling to Cambridge with a third friend, fellow Taiwanese journalist Liu Hai Roh, 35, whom they had known for five years. Miss Roh, who works as a television anchor woman in Hong Kong, remains critically ill.