Russia flew flags at half-mast yesterday in a day of mourning for the victims of a nightclub blaze, as the death toll rose to 113 in one of the country's worst recent tragedies.
Major TV channels said they would suspend entertainment programming and advertising as memorial services were being held across the country.
The city of Perm, about 1,200 kilometres east of Moscow in the Ural Mountains, where the tragedy occurred early Saturday, came to a standstill as residents observed one minute of silence.
Outside the charred ruins of the nightclub a steady stream of residents and survivors laid carnations and lit candles. The death toll in the blaze rose to 113 people yesterday after a 26-year-old girl died in hospital, a Perm regional emergency services mouthpiece told AFP.
The Health Ministry has also published a list of the 109 people injured in the tragedy, 31 of whom are in a critical condition with severe burns.
"The most important thing now is to save those who are injured, many of them in critical condition," Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said yesterday in a televised government meeting on the emergency effort, amid fears the death toll could rise further.Mr Putin added that additional fire-safety checks of public venues will be carried out ahead of the New Year celebrations.
Following the tragedy in Perm, Russia's emergency services chief has also called for a ban on the use of fireworks at concerts and public events.
Four people, including the manager of the nightclub, have been charged with failing to follow fire-safety regulations as prosecutors launched an investigation into the tragedy. They could face seven years in jail.
Flames sparked by fireworks quickly spread through the wooden decor of the Lame Horse nightclub early Saturday, witnesses said, causing panic as some 230 club-goers stampeded in a rush to flee, choking on smoke. Authorities accused club staff of ignoring repeated orders to comply with safety standards, with President Dmitry Medvedev condemning them for having neither "brains nor conscience".