Italy buries earthquake victims.

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Ascoli Piceno, Italy.- With the death in hospital of a wounded man rose Saturday to 291 the number of people killed in the earthquake that hit central Italy on Wednesday, the National Civil Protection Service.

Amatrice, the po[CENSORED]tion most affected by the quake, 230 people died in the nearby town of Accumoli there were 11 fatalities and 50 other Arquata del Tronto, including man died Saturday, said DPA.

The devastating earthquake also killed at least 16 foreigners, including ten Romanians, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Bucharest. 16 other Romanian citizens remain missing. The list of foreign victims also includes three British, one Spanish, one Canadian and one Albanian.

official funeral

With a solemn ceremony marked by pain, Italy buried on Saturday to 35 of the nearly 300 victims of the earthquake.

The ceremony, held in the city of Ascoli Piceno, was attended by President of the Republic, Serious Mattarella and Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, as well as family, friends and relatives of victims of Arquata del Tronto, one of the villages devastated by the quake, said AFP.

The event, the first official ceremony for the victims was held at the sports stadium in Ascoli Piceno, a city located not far from the scene of the tragedy, which was transformed into a chapel.

Thirty-five coffins, placed on a blue mat, were covered with a wreath with white lilies and roses.

Among them he stood a white, Giulia, a nine year old girl whose body protected by his sister, Giorgia, four years, one of the last people extracted alive from the rubble in Pescara del Tronto.

"Our bells ringing again," cried the Bishop Giovanni D'Ercole during the funeral Mass attended by hundreds of people, including local and regional authorities and rescue workers, firefighters and social workers.

"Do not be afraid to scream from the pain, but do not lose hope. We will rebuild together our homes, our churches," said the priest.

Visibly moved, Renzi and his wife avoided giving statements to the press and were limited to embrace the families of the victims at the end of the ceremony.

Outside the stadium, in a deathly silence, the ceremony was broadcast on giant screens, while relatives of the deceased, sitting next to the coffins, crying uncontrollably and hugged each other.

Some families decided not to participate in the Mass and buried their dead in private.

Meanwhile, rescuers were still pulling bodies from the rubble.

Italy declared day of national mourning, flags were flown at half-mast and public radio and television RAI suspended advertisements in all its programs as sign of mourning.

day and night search

A few hours before the ceremony, President Mattarella visited the small village of Amatrice, emblem of the devastation, whose ruins are from lifeless 230 people.

Rescuers worked through the night and managed to get three new bodies under the stone clusters Hotel Rome, where he slept fifty people.

Mattarella praised "the extraordinary effort" that rescue teams have done in the "red zone" where the media do not have access and where only ruins remain.

Another ceremony, bodiless present, has been organized on Wednesday to honor the victims of Accumoli and Amatrice, the other two villages ravaged by the devastating earthquake.

"There are going to be left alone. But say what you can do for you. The decisions we can not take them only in Rome," Renzi said privately to one family.

The same promise made by President Mattarella to a resident who asked for help: "Do not you give up," he repeated several times as he hugged and gave condolences.

Privately and without being accompanied by the press, the head of state visited the wounded in the hospital of Ascoli. Among them the little Giorgia, which gave a doll for his birthday, celebrated this Saturday four years.

More than 1,300 aftershocks have been recorded since early Wednesday causing panic among survivors and rescuers who fear new landslides.

The bridge leading to Amatrice was closed on Friday new cracks, forcing rescue teams to build a diversion with bulldozers and prevent the village is completely isolated.

According to satellite data from the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) land he fell from about twenty centimeters in the area.

Many of the victims were tourists and children who spent holidays with their grandparents, who live in that region.

The Civil Protection announced that about 2,500 people were left homeless and pernotan in the 42 tents installed. After the tragedy, Italy questions the human cost of the earthquakes and the lack of a policy to avoid them.

More than 24 million Italians live in an area of seismic risk and the country lacks a culture of prevention, as acknowledged by the Government.