UK Chinese in tribute to victims

The Chinese embassy in London was opening a book of condolences as Chinese government buildings flew the flag at half-mast.

Three minutes of silence were held at 7.28am UK time, exactly one week after the 7.9-magnitude earthquake struck, killing an estimated 50,000 people.

Ping Hayward, director of the London Chinatown Chinese Community Centre, said a fundraising event in the capital on Sunday had raised £70,000 for relief efforts.

She said: "Our people are suffering in mainland China and the Chinese people feel they should make a contribution to support them. Schools have been destroyed and there are a lot of homeless. There are children buried under school buildings. It is awful."

The Chinese Embassy in London has listed urgently-needed relief equipment, including X-ray machines, optical search devices and circular saws, as well as water purifiers, stretchers, tents and wheelchairs.

British tourists on a panda-watching trip at the Wolong Nature Reserve, in Wenchuan county, when the earthquake struck have themselves been thanking the Chinese people.

Judy Ling Wong, 59, from Llanberis, north Wales, told the China Daily in Beijing: "We were in the middle of the panda centre, surrounded by sheer cliffs. Rocks fell all around. But here I am, completely fine - and that is only half the miracle. The other half is the Chinese people and the way they took care of us."

The 19 British tourists spent three nights on a bus, unable to contact the outside world, before being evacuated to Chengdu by Chinese military helicopter.

Official figures put the death toll at 34,073, with more than 220,000 injured.