According to embassy officials, a total of 15 such cases involving 16 South Korean gamblers, who are either tourists or residents, have been reported to the embassy so far since April this year.

A South Korean man in his 40s went missing last week after playing at a Manila casino with a loan of 13 million won from a Chinese gang. He was abducted after losing all of the funds and was unable to pay back the loan.

After the victim alerted the embassy to his location with his cell phone, the embassy, in cooperation with local police, tracked him to a house just north of Manila, where they also found another Korean national and a Chinese woman detained against their will for at least one month.

Lee Soo-bok, police consul at the embassy, said illegal lending by many Chinese loan sharks is rampant in the Philippines.

"Chinese private lenders offer loans to gamblers irrespective of their nationalities, and abduct and detain them as a way to collect their loans," he said.

Following their rescue, some South Korean victims returned home without cooperating with the local police's investigation into the perpetrators, the embassy said.

The embassy said, in order to prevent such similar cases from recurring, it plans to ask the South Korean police to investigate alleged gambling by South Koreans who don't cooperate with the local police and leave the Southeast Asian country. (Yonhap)