TOKYO, Jan. 17 (Xinhua) -- Japan's Kobe and its surrounding areas marked on Sunday the 15th anniversary of the Great Hanshin Earthquake, which left more than 6,000 people dead and caused a huge amount of damage to the infrastructure of the area, said reports from the central Japanese port city of Kobe.
The earthquake struck at 5:46 on the morning of Jan. 17 in 1995,and with a magnitude of 7.3, was the worse to hit Japan since the great Kanto earthquake of 1923.
People gathered at public spaces throughout the Hanshin region to remember the dead, and many were seen with tears.
Kobe Mayor Tatsuo Yada referred to the recent earthquake in Haiti in a speech to commemorate the anniversary. "Overseas, just a few days ago, a powerful earthquake struck Haiti, and serious disasters have occurred in other regions as well, forcing us to realize that there is always a danger of tragedy striking," he said.
Meanwhile, Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama wrote on his Twitter microblogging account, "Today I will go to a ceremony in Kobe to mark the anniversary of the Great Hanshin Earthquake, and I will express my sympathy to the families of the victims from the bottom of my heart."
Kobe mourns, but community stands triumphant through tragedy
TOKYO, Jan. 17 (Xinhua) -- Millions of people across Japan on Sunday paid homage to the people who lost their lives in the Great Hanshin Earthquake, which leveled the western port city of Kobe 15-years ago to the day.
Ceremonies commemorating the 15th anniversary of the Great Hanshin Earthquake began on Saturday across the country, with local primary school students from Kobe's neighboring Amagasaki City banding together to build 49 small "kamakura" snow huts in Tachibana Park, to commemorate the 49 residents of the city who lost their lives in the 1995 disaster. Full story
Moderate earthquake hits east of Japan
HONG KONG, Jan. 17 (Xinhua) -- A moderate earthquake measuring 5.6 on the Richter scale occurred off the east coast of Honshu, Japan at 3:11 p.m. local time Sunday (0611GMT), according to a bulletin released by the Hong Kong Observatory on Sunday.
The epicenter was initially determined to be 38.0 degrees north latitude and 143.6 degrees east longitude, about 240 kilometers east of Sendai, Japan. Full story |
