Chinese President Hu Jintao sent a message Saturday to Kim Jong-il, leader of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), expressing deep condolences over the train blast in the DPRK.  

In a message, Hu said that he, on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese government, extends deep condolences to Kim and the relatives of the victims.

Hu said China is ready to provide the DPRK with necessary aid.

He hoped the DPRK people will soon recover from the disaster.

China decides to offer aid to DPRK for train accident

Chinese Ministry of Commerce announced in Beijing Saturday that the Chinese government decided to offer aid to the DPRK for the train explosion.

The assistance valued at 10 million yuan (US$1.21 million) will be given to the DPRK side in a few days, which includes food, medicine, medical equipment and tents, sources said.

A massive explosion took place when two fuel-laden trains collided on Thursday afternoon near a DPRK station in Ryongchon, and many people were killed or injured as a result. To express sympathy to the DPRK people, the Chinese government decided to provide the assistance to the DPRK government for its rescue work, sources said.

China deeply concerned about DPRK train explosion

The Chinese government is deeply concerned about the train explosion in the DPRK, said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Kong Quan in Beijing Saturday.

After the accident, Chinese President Hu Jintao has sent a message of condolences to DPRK leader Kim Jong-il to express sympathy of the Communist Party of China, Chinese government and Chinese people, Kong said.

"We expressed our deep condolences to victims of the explosion," he said.

The Chinese government has decided to provide assistance to the DPRK side and the departments concerned have made preparations for necessary treatment of the injured and other assistance, he added.

DPRK cites human error in crash

The DPRK Saturday said that human "carelessness" contributed to the train blast that killed hundreds of people near the border with China, as international aid workers rushed to the site in response to the DPRK's appeal for help.

In its first statement on Thursday's disaster, DPRK's official news agency said the blast was touched off by "electrical contact caused by carelessness during the shunting of wagons loaded with ammonium nitrate fertilizer."

The news agency for DPRK's government said that an investigation into the explosion at the railway station "so far shows that the damage is very serious."

The statement also expressed appreciation for offers of international humanitarian assistance. Those offers came in the hours after the government issued a rare appeal for foreign help, inviting aid workers to visit the disaster site.

US defense officials said damage from the blast extended at least 200 yards from the explosion at a railway station in Ryongchon, a city with chemical and metalworking plants and a reported population of 130,000.

American intelligence analysts thought it was probably a coincidence that the blast happened nine hours after DPRK leader Kim Jong-il passed through the station on his way home from a three-day visit to Beijing.

US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said the United States is evaluating the situation in the DPRK to see "if there is a need or an opportunity for the United States to help."

DPRK officials told diplomats and aid groups that more than 1,000 people were injured and thousands of apartments and houses destroyed or damaged in the blast.

They said many more could be trapped in collapsed buildings near the station. Red Cross workers were distributing tents and blankets to 4,000 families.

"In Pyongyang, we already hold out our hands to the world community," DPRK's Deputy UN Ambassador Kim Chang-guk told Associated Press Television News. He said Pyongyang was seeking "generous help from the world community."

He said he didn't have further details about the explosion.

"I don't know what really happened, but I think it is very serious because our government held out hand to the world community for help," he said in New York. "It means it is a great incident."

He said Ambassador Pak Gil-yon officially requested UN help Friday. A UN mission, accompanied by several aid agencies, was to arrive at the disaster site Saturday to assess humanitarian needs and offer immediate support, UN spokesman Fred Eckhard said.

China's UN Ambassador Wang Guangya urged the international community to respond to the rare call for help from the DPRK.

"This is unusual for DPRK. So I think that the international community should be forthcoming, be positive in responding to their request," Wang said.

The British Broadcasting Corp. showed on its Web site what it said was a satellite photo taken 18 hours after the explosion. The black-and-white photo showed huge clouds of black smoke billowing from the site.

Chosun Ilbo newspaper of the Republic of Korea (ROK), citing a ROK intelligence source, said a US spy satellite photograph showed damage mostly in densely populated neighborhoods east of the station, which included buildings for the military and ruling Workers' Party.

"Hospitals are jam-packed with people injured," Chosun Ilbo quoted a Chinese witness as saying.

There was no sign in Dandong, a Chinese border city about 12 miles from Ryongchon, of injured Koreans. But the city's three biggest hospitals were preparing for a possible surge of patients.

"We're ready to offer our close neighbor our best medical help anytime," said an official at Dandong Chinese Hospital.

In Seoul, capital of the ROK, Unification Minister Jeong Se-hyun said China was urging the DPRK to send the injured to hospitals in China.

(Sources including Xinhua News Agency and China Daily, April 24, 2004)