The death toll from the stampede in Seoul during the Halloween party at the end of October has risen to 158, South Korean authorities announced today.
A woman in her 20s is the latest fatality, the Disaster and Emergency Response Command revealed.
Last week, the death of a soldier, also in his twenties, was announced.
Most of the 158 dead are women (102) and people between the ages of 20 and 30 (105).
A total of 26 foreigners were killed, from countries such as Russia, Iran, China, the United States, Japan, Norway, Sri Lanka, Austria, Vietnam, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and France, of which 24 have already been sent to the country of origin .
The stampede came as a crowd gathered on the night of Oct. 29 to celebrate the first Halloween party since the pandemic that took place in Seoul’s cosmopolitan Itaewon district.
About 100,000 people were expected, but due to the unofficial nature of the event, neither police nor local authorities actively controlled the crowd.
Police later acknowledged that they sent only 137 officers to Itaewon on the fateful night, insisting that this number was higher than that of Halloween parties in previous years.
Meanwhile, 6,500 police officers were mobilized for another party in the South Korean capital, with only 25,000 taking part, according to the local press, in a country where the numerous and frequent demonstrations are often framed by a larger number of officers. of the participants.
But in the case of the Halloween festivities in Itaewon, there was no one in charge of organizing it. Participants spontaneously gathered at parties in various bars, clubs and restaurants.
Seoul Mayor Oh Se-hoon issued a public apology and tearfully said he felt “infinitely responsible for this accident”.
South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol said South Korea urgently needed to improve its crowd management system.
“People’s safety is important whether there is an organizer of the event or not,” Suk-yeol said during a meeting with members of the government, who asked the country to equip itself with “advanced technologies” to tackle the manage stress better.
However, several local analysts said these tools already exist and were not used in Itaewon.
The Seoul City Council has a real-time crowd monitoring system that uses mobile phone data to predict the size of the turnout at an event, but according to local press reports, it was not used on Saturday night.
Itaewon district authorities also failed to mount security patrols, with officials saying the Halloween event was considered more of a “phenomenon” than a “festival”, which would require an official mass control plan.
Source: DN
