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Tuesday, January 29, 2002 - Web posted at 1:40:31 pm GMT

LAGOS - The death toll from bomb explosions at an armoury in the Nigerian city of Lagos which triggered a mass stampede climbed above 600 on Tuesday after more bodies were retrieved from a canal, officials said.

Flags flew at half mast at government offices after President Olusegun Obasanjo declared Tuesday a national day of mourning to mark the worst disaster in a decade in Nigeria's biggest city.

Rescuers on Monday retrieved hundreds of bodies of people who drowned in two canals after massive bomb explosions in the Ikeja district of Lagos sparked a stampede on Sunday.

"As of last night, a total of 600 bodies were retrieved from the canals," Lagos State Commissioner for Information Dele Alake told Reuters.

Rescuers told Reuters they had found more bodies after resuming the search on Tuesday. More than a dozen other deaths were reported by witnesses elsewhere in the city of over 10 million people. Nampa-Reuters

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