Grieving and angry parents yesterday marked one month since China?s devastating earthquake toppled schools, demanding an explanation and apologising to their loved ones buried under the rubble.

Growing numbers of parents gathered in front of the powdery concrete and twisted steel, all that remains of the Beichuan No. 1 Middle School, complaining about the quality of construction and corruption.

China has announced nationwide safety checks for schools after many collapsed in the quake while nearby government offices and apartments stayed standing.

Few families in hard-hit parts of Sichuan province escaped losses among those killed in the May 12 quake ? close to 70,000 according to the latest count, with many thousands missing and likely dead. Whole towns like Beichuan, which had 30,000 residents, have been abandoned with many dead entombed in rubble.

There was a growing police presence at the Beichuan school, where two parents said they were blocked from holding a memorial. Some 1,300 children were killed there. ?They said this building was strong and quake-proof, but when we saw it, the concrete was like talcum powder and the steel was as thin as noodles,? said Mu Qibing, whose 17-year-old son was killed. ?None of us have seen our children yet, not even after one month.?

Other parents spoke to the rubble, apologising to their dead children and blaming themselves for failing them. One couple burnt ceremonial funeral money, incense and their child?s clothes on the rubble.

Parents of children who died at the Juyuan Middle School said that their planned memorial service at the site was being blocked by police who went from door to door warning them to stay away. ?All we want to do is remember them this day,? Zhao Deqin, a mother whose 15-year-old twin daughters, Yajia and Yaqi, died.

For other residents of this lush region of rice paddies and bamboo thickets, the one-month date began as just another day in what will be a long struggle to cope with sweltering, crowded tent camps and worries over jobs and education.

Victims? impatience

The ruling Chinese Communist Party?s response to the quake, with a sweeping relief operation and storm of patriotic propaganda, has so far won widespead public support. But as the quake region enters a vast rebuilding phase, the government is sure to be tested by victims? impatience for new lives.