KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 8 (Bernama) -- The Information Communications and Culture Ministry will improve the Malaysia Emergency Response Services (MERS) 999 for public convenience, said its secretary-general, Datuk Seri Kamaruddin Siaraf.

He said this would be done by enhancing cooperation among five agencies involved in providing emergency services in tackling prank and crank calls received by MERS centres in Kuala Lumpur, Melaka and Sarawak.

"We want to get rid of prank and crank calls to MERS 999 and we have assigned a team of employees to deal with them.

"Two-third or 68 per cent of calls made to MERS 999 daily to the police, Fire and Rescue Department, hospitals, Civil Defence Department and Malaysian Maritime Enforcement Agency were prank and crank calls," he told reporters after opening the Asia Navigator 2012 here today.

He said the conference was one of the efforts made to solve prank and crank calls besides conducting awareness campaigns.

Ten experts in the field of emergency communication will dabble on ways to provide an excellent emergency service to the community at the conference.

Meanwhile, International Academies of Emergency Dispatch president Scott Freitag said being a leader in emergency communication and dispatch protocols, Malaysia was becoming better over the years.

Commending the professionalism of employees who took MERS 999 calls, he said experts from around the world, who attended the conference, would help teach them to be even better.

He stressed the importance of culturalisation of the protocols to enable every emergency call to be attended properly and appropriately.

The conference hosted by IAED in collaboration with the Malaysian Academy of Public Safety provides a common platform for agencies and governments in Asia to compare notes in the field of public safety and emergency response.

About 150 participants from Indonesia, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Cambodia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, the Philippines and Malaysia are attending the three-day conference.