Some leaders – such as U.S. President Barack Obama, the head of government of Germany Angela Merkel, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and several European monarchs – canceled their plans to attend the funeral on Sunday because of the thick cloud of volcanic ash lies down on Europe. However, some European leaders announced they will travel by car to Krakow.
Obama “waited as much as possible before taking the decision because he wanted to come,” said Lee Feinstein, U.S. ambassador to Poland. “But he was unable to travel,” he said.
The Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero also made the trip.
The crowd at the Pilsudski Square waved red and white Polish flags adorned with black ribbons of mourning. On a large white stage stood a large cross flanked by photos of President Lech Kaczynski and other victims of the accident.
Among the audience was Marta, the only daughter of the presidential couple, and Jaroslaw Kaczynski, twin brother of the late president and former prime minister and President Lech Walesa, Prime Minister Donald Tusk and the Acting Chairman Bronislaw Komorowski.
“Our world fell with a crash for the second time in the same place, “Komorowski said about the accident in the forest of Katyn, Russia, the same place of the slaughter of Polish officers during World War II.
Tusk called the success of “the greatest tragedy for Poland since the war.”
After the tribute, the remains of the presidential couple were taken to the Gothic Cathedral of San Juan for a mass.
The funeral will also begin on Sunday with a Mass at 1200 GMT in the basilica of Santa Maria in Cracow. Then a procession will move the bodies of the president and his wife Mary at the historic Wawel Cathedral where they will be finally buried.
Several monarchs who thought the funeral also had to cancel their plans, including the kings of Spain, Juan Carlos and Sofia, the Prince of Wales and King Carl of Sweden.
The German government reported that Chancellor Merkel has canceled plans to attend the funeral. The government added that Merkel had informed its decision to the Polish Minister of Foreign Affairs Radoslav Sikorski, who “understood” the reasons.
Delegations of Mexico, Egypt, Macedonia, India, Japan, Korea South, New Zealand and Pakistan also canceled.
However, the presidents of the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia and Ukraine had planned to travel by car. Although ibect was expected that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev attend.
Poland airports remained closed Saturday for flights above the level of the ash cloud at about 6,000 meters ( 20,000 feet).
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Journalists from The Associated Press and Marta Kucharska Vanessa Gera contributed to this report.
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