麻豆约拍

*Warning: Contains details of events that you may find distressing*

South Korea is in shock after more than 150 people - many of them teenagers - died in a surging crowd packed into an alley in the capital. Itaewon, a popular nightlife district, became a magnet for thousands of Halloween revellers after Covid restrictions were finally lifted.

Reports describe a desperate scene of people caught up in the crush piling on top of each other. Most of the dead were teenagers or in their 20s. Nineteen were foreigners. The cause of the disaster is still being established.

Alex Jensen is a freelance journalist based in Seoul. He told Weekend, "It's just staggering. Images of dozens of people receiving CPR, all over social media."

"I lived in the area for 12 years and I've seen Halloween develop in that time... Itaewon became a real target area for young people to go and have fun," he says. "I would take my young kids... to go and have a look at the live Halloween show with all these young people in their teens and 20s but every year it seemed to get busier and busier."

(Photo: People have left flowers in front of the alley in Itaewon where people died and were injured in Saturday night's crush. Credit: Reuters)

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