adminLA PAZ. – Four people were killed and more than 60 injured Saturday when a bridge collapsed onto spectators and marching musicians in the opening Carnival parade in the Oruro highlands.
Interior Minister Carlos Romero said three of the dead were musicians from the Poopo band, while the other was walking on the temporary footbridge, which collapsed due to overload.
Bolivian President Evo Morales, a band musician in his youth, “has sent his condolences and sympathy, and expressed solidarity with the families of the victims and the people of Oruro as a whole,” Romero said.
Despite the tragedy, the local folklore association vowed to keep the festival running.
Around 300,000 people usually attend the parade in the southwestern Andean mining town of Oruro, known as Bolivia’s capital of folklore, in honor of the Virgin of Candelaria, patron saint of the tunnels. — AFP
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