Nepal held a day of mourning Monday to remember people who died in the Aug. 26 floods with government offices lowering flags and family members concluding mourning rituals.
Monday is the 13th day since the flooding that has killed more than 1,300 people in Nepal and Tibet and left some 5,000 missing including foreigners, according to Nepal’s disaster management agency.
In Hindu-dominated Nepal, mourning periods last 13 days, in which close family members stay home and relatives visit to pay respect. On the final or 13th day, rituals are held to pray for the departed souls.
Several people whose family members are still missing have performed symbolic funerals with mourning rituals. In Hindu tradition, cremation is an important final rite, and for some families, performing the ceremony even without the bodies of their loved ones provides a sense of spiritual release.
The government previously announced Monday would be an official day of mourning with all offices lowering their flags to half staff.
In Kathmandu, family members gathered near the offices of the prime minister and key ministries to demand the government speed up the search and rescue for the hundreds of people who were working on hydropower plants and were either swept by the rushing Bhotekhoshi river buried by the debris.
Search efforts were continuing for hundreds of people who are still unaccounted for.
Rescuers pulled out a Chinese man Saturday from a power plant, and two Nepalese workers were rescued from the plant Friday.
Rescue efforts have increasingly focused on 12 hydropower projects, where about 900 workers are missing and roughly 500 are believed to be trapped in various tunnels, authorities said. Specialized rescue teams from India, China, South Korea and the United States have been searching through debris, damaged structures and tunnels at the projects, hoping to find survivors.
