World

Poland holds memorial service for plane crash victims

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-04-18 09:40

People gather at Pilsudski square in Warsaw, April 17, 2010. A public memorial service has begun for the 96 victims of last weekend's air crash that killed Poland's president, drawing tens of thousands of mouners to a square in the heart of Warsaw. [Xinhua]

At the family's insistence, the funeral for the late president and his wife was expected to go ahead as planned on Sunday, despite drifting volcanic ash from Iceland that has shut Europe's airports and forced the cancellation of thousands of flights.

The first Polish couple and many of the country's military and state elite were killed when their plane crashed near Smolensk, Russia, while trying to land in thick fog ahead.

The delegation had planned to attend a memorial marking the 70th anniversary of the massacre of thousands of Polish army officers by Russian security forces in 1940.

Tusk at the memorial service called the plane crash a disaster that was "the greatest tragedy in Poland since the war."

Earlier on Saturday, pedestrians and vehicles came to a standstill at 8:56 a.m. (0656 GMT) in Warsaw, the exact time a week ago when the presidential jet crashed in Russia and plunged Poland into a deep grief not seen since the death of Pope John Paul II five years ago.