A mass funeral for victims of the Abruzzo earthquake is to take place shortly as Italy holds a day of national mourning for its 287 dead.
The families of those who died and senior political figures are among those who will attend the state funeral outside the shattered city of L'Aquila.
At least 150 victims are being buried on Friday, local reports say.
Meanwhile, Italy's president said poor construction was to blame for many of the deaths in Monday's disaster.
Visiting the region on Thursday, Giorgio Napolitano said there had been "widespread irresponsibility" in the design and construction of modern buildings.
The government has extended the search for people who could still be alive under the rubble until Sunday.
But rescue workers believe the chances of finding anyone alive are remote and so will focus on recovering bodies and assessing the extent of the damage.
Aftershocks are continuing to hamper rescue efforts. On Thursday evening a tremor measuring 4.9, the fourth-largest since the earthquake, brought down a badly damaged four-storey building in the centre of L'Aquila.
Civil protection authorities raised the death toll to 287 on Thursday night.
Christian message
The earthquake victims will be honoured in a two-hour, open-air service at a police training base outside L'Aquila, beginning at 1100 local time (0900 GMT).
 Masses are being said for victims and survivors of the earthquake |
The Mass will be celebrated by the Archbishop of L'Aquila, Giuseppe Molinari, and a senior representative of the Pope, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone.
President Napolitano and Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi will also attend.
Visibly overcome with emotion, Archbishop Molinari spoke earlier to about 300 worshippers in one of the large tent camps for the homeless.
"I can't say any learned words to explain what happened but I can say that Christ has risen," he said, speaking just before Easter.
Pope Benedict celebrated a Holy Thursday Mass that included the traditional blessing of holy oils, some of which the Church will send to the earthquake zone as a sign of solidarity.
The Italian government has also moved to ease financial pressures on the survivors.
It has approved a package of emergency financial measures providing money to pay rents, and suspending gas and electricity bills for two months.
Building standards
On Thursday, Mr Napolitano visited both L'Aquila and the devastated nearby village of Onna, as well as one of the camps sheltering some of the 28,000 people left homeless by the quake.
 |   |
He called for an investigation to find out how it was possible that essential buildings standards had not been applied.
Modern buildings that suffered partial or total collapse in the quake include a hospital, city buildings, the provincial seat and university buildings, AFP news agency reports.
"No one should shut their eyes," President Napolitano said.
Franco Barberi, a member of the parliamentary committee on major risk prevention, told the Italian daily newspaper Corriere della Sera: "The same earthquake in California would not have killed a single person."
About 1,000 damage assessors have begun to check premises to see which ones are safe.
Early on Thursday, three bodies were pulled by rescue workers from the ruins of a four-storey university dormitory in L'Aquila. In all, seven students were killed when the building collapsed.
|  |
At least 16 children, including a five-month-old baby, were killed by Monday's 6.3-magnitude earthquake.
"As long as we know that there are people under the rubble, we will keep searching even if we're sure they're dead," one fireman told the Reuters news agency.
"Families need to know what happened to their loved ones."
Aftershocks have been complicating rescue efforts.
One 5.2-magnitude tremor at 0253 (0053 GMT) on Thursday caused damage to buildings in L'Aquila and several nearby villages, but there were no reports of further victims.
No comments:
Post a Comment