China considers post-quake plan as parents protest

By Lindsay Beck

WUFU, China (Reuters) - Top Chinese officials considered on Tuesday a plan to rebuild earthquake-ravaged parts of the country's southwest while protests by grieving parents and dangerous quake lakes cast a shadow over relief efforts.

The earthquake centered in Sichuan province has killed 69,107 people and displaced more than 15 million, according to official figures on Tuesday. The death toll is likely to rise with 18,230 still listed as missing.

Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has nonetheless vowed to move quickly to rebuild towns and villages devastated by the May 12 quake. He and other officials met to discuss a reconstruction plan for the region, state television reported.

"As quickly as possibly restore agricultural production in the disaster area," the officials urged, also calling for rapid road repairs and reviving trade and services.

But protests by parents who lost children in schools destroyed during the quake also flared, underscoring the tensions that could erupt as grieving gives way to anger.

Many schools collapsed in the quake, killing more than 9,000 students and teachers according to figures compiled by Reuters.

Many parents blame shoddy buildings for the deaths, pointing to apartments and government offices that survived while nearby schools fell.

In Dujiangyan, a small city near the Sichuan province capital Chengdu, police prevented some 150 grieving parents from seeking to lodge a lawsuit over a collapsed middle school, Japan's Kyodo news agency reported.

Officers dragged away sobbing mothers clasping pictures of children killed when a school building crumpled, the report said. It said the parents want to sue the school and its principal.

In the farming town of Wufu, angry parents kept vigil at the ruins of a school, demanding those responsible be punished.

Nearly every building withstood the earthquake -- except the three-storey Fuxin Number Two Primary School which collapsed, killing 129 children.

"We come here every day," said a woman named Zhang, whose 10-year-old daughter died under the rubble.

"The children are here. We want to keep the children company until there is a result."

WAITING FOR LAKE TO DRAIN

Troops and disaster officials have also been seeking to defuse threats from dangerous build-ups of water created by quake-caused landslides choking rivers.