Pakistan holds funerals for 14 children

LAHORE: Pakistani mourners shouldered bedframes in a procession through the narrow streets of Lahore's Kahna area on Wednesday as they carried the bodies of 14 children killed when the roof of their tutoring centre collapsed the night before. Residents and families gathered by freshly dug graves at a nearby cemetery before returning to a neighbourhood where frantic rescue efforts had given way to mourning.
Grief engulfed the community in Pakistan's second-largest city, with some wiping away tears and embracing while others called for urgent action by authorities to prevent further disasters. Residents of the disadvantaged neighbourhood to the south of Lahore said they had suspicions that the building housing the tutoring centre was rundown.
The roof collapse has fuelled anger alongside grief, with the community questioning how an apparently unsafe building had been allowed to house a private tutoring centre. Authorities have promised an investigation and police said two people were taken into custody on Tuesday night. Broken bricks, twisted steel beams and shattered concrete lay strewn across the ground at the collapse site as local residents looked on in disbelief. — AFP