查看完整版本: China mourns as quake death toll climbs

China mourns as quake death toll climbs

[b]CNN)[/b] -- Crowds gathered in the devastated city of Chengdu shouted "Farewell, friends!" and "Rebuild!" as China began three days of national mourning Monday to honor the tens of thousands killed by last week's massive earthquake.

The death toll in worst-hit Sichuan province, southwestern China, rose to at least 34,073 with another 245,109 people hurt, Chinese government officials said Monday. Authorities have estimated that the final death toll could reach 50,000, while millions more people have been left homeless by the disaster.

Traffic halted, work stopped and people bowed their heads across the country to observe three minutes of silence as air raid sirens, car, truck and train horns sounded a "wail of grief" at 2:28 p.m. (0628 GMT), exactly one week since the earthquake struck. Even rescue workers paused from the job of clearing debris and searching for survivors to mark the moment.

In Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan, the three minutes was followed by shouts of support for the recovery effort, CNN correspondent Eunice Yoon said.

"During the moment of silence they were all holding hands, some of them were weeping... They are in a state of utter disbelief and utter shock that so many people have died," said Yoon.

Meanwhile, at least 200 rescue workers have been buried by mud slides during the past three days, a transport ministry official told the official Xinhua state news agency.

Two construction machines and six vehicles were also buried in the mud flows during efforts to repair quake-shattered roads in the region, Dai Dongchang told Xinhua.

Earlier, Xinhua reported that two women had been pulled alive from the rubble of a collapsed residential building in the Sichuan county of Beichuan.

Wang Fazhen, 50, was rescued at about 10:30 a.m. local time Monday. The other woman, who was not identified, was pulled from the same area about 40 minutes later, the agency reported.

On Sunday a 53-year-old man, was pulled out of the rubble in Yingxiu town in Sichuan's Wenchuan county -- near the epicenter -- 148 hours after the quake, Xinhua said. The effort took eight hours, the news agency said.

In Beijing's Tiananmen Square around 2,600 people watched as the national flag was ceremonially lowered to half-mast. Flags throughout the country were also lowered and condolences books were opened in China's Foreign Ministry and Chinese embassies and consulates around the world, Xinhua reported.

NN's Beijing bureau chief Jaime Florcruz said it was the first time China had formally commemorated the victims of a natural disaster in a period of national mourning.

The Olympic torch relay was suspended during the mourning period, [url=http://topics.edition.cnn.com/topics/China][b][color=#004276]China[/color][/b][/url]'s state-run television announced. The torch was going to be in the eastern cities of Ningbo and Jiaxing in Zhejiang Province on Monday, then in Shanghai on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Resources continue to be pour into the nation's massive relief operations even as hopes faded for those still missing more than seven days since the quake struck.

So far, almost 60 aid organizations from 13 countries have provided assistance to China in the aftermath of the quake. Among the countries are India, France, Singapore, the Philippines and the United States.

Two U.S. military planes landed in Chengdu Sunday with blankets, water and other relief supplies. The first plane -- a C-17 cargo jet -- flew from a U.S. base in Hawaii, while the second flight came from Alaska, officials said.

The quake was the worst tremor to strike China in three decades; a 1976 earthquake killed more than 250,000 people.

Chinese officials said Monday they had made major progress towards restoring power supplies throughout the quake-damaged region.
Electricity production and distribution has been returned to a level about 80 percent of what it was before the quake, although the four hardest hit counties closest to the epicenter are still without power, an official said. Telecommunication services have been restored to 76 of the 109 townships in the province, another official said.

The government said Monday that companies affected by the quake had sufffered $9.5 billion in damage, The Associated Press reported. Independent estimates suggest the final cost to the economy could reach $20 billion.

China stands still to mourn quake victims

WENCHUAN, China (AP) -- China stood still Monday in mourning over tens of thousands of earthquake victims, and the government appealed for more international aid to cope with the country's deadliest disaster in a generation.

Construction workers, shopkeepers and bureaucrats across the bustling nation of 1.3 billion people paused for three minutes at 2:28 p.m. - exactly one week after the magnitude 7.9 quake hit central China.

Air-raid sirens and the horns of cars and buses sounded in memory of the dead.

In Beijing's Tiananmen Square, thousands of people bowed their heads and then began shouting "Long Live China!" and thrusting their fists in the air. Traffic on the capital's highways and roads stopped, and some drivers got out of their cars.

The confirmed death toll from the May 12 quake rose to 34,073, the State Council, China's Cabinet, said Monday. Another 9,500 remained buried in Sichuan and more than 29,000 were missing, the provincial government said, according to Xinhua.

Officials have said they expect final death toll to exceed 50,000, with more than 245,000 reported as injured. Quake-related losses to companies totaled $9.5 billion, Deputy Industry Minister Xi Guohua said.

In an indication of the challenge in dealing with millions of homeless and injured survivors, China said it would accept foreign medical teams and issued an international appeal for tents.

"China requests the international community donate tents as a priority when they donate materials because many houses were toppled in the quake and because it is the rainy season," ministry spokesman Qin Gang said in a statement, also thanking the international community for its help so far.

An official confirmed mudslides had caused some deaths but gave no details. "The total death toll is still being counted," said the official at the Sichuan provincial Communications Department who only gave his last name, Shi.

More potential landslides were predicted by the Central Meteorological Observatory, with heavy rains forecast this week for some areas close to the epicenter.

Meanwhile, 14 Taiwanese escaped a massive landslide in Sichuan. They were located by authorities using satellite positioning data from the group's tour bus on Friday, Chinese authorities said, and were set to head home Monday.

The military was still struggling to reach areas cut off by the earthquake, with more than 10,000 discovered stranded in Yinxiui valley near the epicenter, China National Radio said Monday. There was no information on casualties there, and 600 soldiers were hiking into the area.

During three days of national mourning ordered by the government, flags were to fly at half-staff and public entertainment was canceled - an unprecedented outpouring of state sympathy on a level normally reserved for dead leaders.

Rescuers also briefly halted work in the disaster zone, where the hunt for survivors turned glum despite remarkable survival tales among thousands buried. Two women were rescued Monday after being trapped in the rubble of a collapsed building at a coal mine in Sichuan, Xinhua reported.

A convoy of police cars, ambulances and other rescue vehicles let off a long blast from their horns as the workers in orange jumpsuits stood quietly with eyes downcast, some removing their white hardhats.

"Our hearts are so heavy, so many of our compatriots are dead," said rescuer Ma Tang Chuan. "As long as we try out best, we have some small hope."

Volunteers at Wangfujing shopping street handed out white ribbons reading, "lovingly remember," before hundreds of shopkeepers spilled into the street. The period of silence started early and ended up stretching past the three-minute mark, before it was broken by a burst of sound from a construction site next door.


"It's the first time we've stopped," said Bai Zhenzong, a worker at the site. "This is awful. This shows how importantly the Chinese government is treating this."

Chinese President Hu Jintao and other top Communist Party leaders were shown on state TV bowing their heads, white flowers pinned to the lapels of their dark suits. Hu had spent three days touring the worst-hit areas of Sichuan.

The moment of tribute also was marked in Hong Kong, where double-decker buses sounded their horns. Rides and performances were halted for three minutes at Hong Kong Disneyland, and the daily fireworks show was canceled.

The government order for the mourning period said all Internet entertainment and game sites had to be taken off-line and users redirected to sites dedicated to commemorating earthquake victims, the Chinese news Web portal sina.com said.

China's National Grand Theater will cancel or postpone all performances during the three days, and media reports said numerous bars, nightclubs, karaoke parlors and movie theaters had shut down beginning at midnight in major cities such as Beijing, Shenyang and Changsha.

Newspapers across China printed their logos in black and some ran entirely without color. Several front pages were covered in black, with simple messages in white text across the middle: "The nation mourns," "Pray for life," and "National tragedy."

The mourning period begins as hope of finding more trapped survivors dwindled, and preventing hunger and disease among the homeless became more pressing.

Hu Yongcui, 38, said she did not care about the official show of mourning as she headed to Beichuan, near the quake's epicenter, to search for her missing 17-year-old daughter.

"I can't feel anything. I have no words," she said. "I just want to go home. I just want to find my daughter."

In a sign the search for survivors was concluding, Japan said it was considering withdrawing rescue crews to be replaced with an expanded medical team to treat survivors because of declining opportunities to use their technology to hunt for trapped victims.

"It's been a week since the earthquake and at this point chances we can make use of our technology is very limited. It's time to think about what to do with our rescue operation," Chief Cabinet Secretary Nobutaka Machimura told reporters, according to Japan's Kyodo News agency.

"There is definitely a need for medical experts, and we can dispatch a team whenever there is a request," he said.

In Dujiangyan, three local government officials were removed from their posts for dereliction of duty over the earthquake - the first officials punished, Xinhua reported. One of the officials was reprimanded for miscounting casualty figures, while the others were punished for failing to come to work.

The Communist Party's discipline committee had instructed all officials to "stand at the front line" of the disaster and vowed to deal harshly with those who did not, the agency said.