Taoiseach Brian Cowen signed the book of condolences for the victims of the Chinese earthquake today.
Mr Cowen signed the book at the residence of Chinese ambassador HE Liu Biwei in Ballsbridge this morning.
A 7.9 magnitude earthquake hit the Sichuan province of southwestern China on May 12th, leaving up to 80,000 people dead or missing. Hundreds of thousands of others were injured.
Chinese soldiers scatter disinfectant on a street in the earthquake-hit Beichuan county in Sichuan province
Ireland has already pledged €1 million to help earthquake relief efforts. Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin said earlier this month Ireland’s rapid response corps could also be used in the relief effort if needed.
The corps, which is run by the Irish Aid division of the Department of Foreign Affairs, was created last year to respond to international crises.
President Mary McAleese has also express her sympathy on behalf of the Irish people.
A magnitude 5.8 aftershock hit the earthquake zone yesterday, compounding the misery for traumatised survivors in the region and causing even more damage. According to reports, at least one person was killed, 400 were injured and 70,000 houses were toppled by the tremor in Qingchuan.
Almost all of Qingchuan's houses had been declared unsafe after a devastating earthquake on May 12, and residents had moved into tents on the fringes of town. A mountain slope abutting the town had shown a crack, leading to fears it could smother part of the city in a landslide.
The focus of authorities in Sichuan is now on secondary disasters such as flooding and landslides, epidemics and providing shelter for the five million left homeless by the catastrophe.
One of Sichuan's worrisome "quake lakes", formed when landslides block a river, is near the aftershock's epicentre in Hongguang.
Concerned by a steep rise in the water level of a giant lake at Tangjiashan on the Jian River, authorities want to blast a hole in the barrier before it bursts and causes a flash flood. Thousands below the lake have been evacuated as a precaution.
The Beijing Olympic flame will spend just one day in Tibet next month rather that the three days originally scheduled due to the devastating earthquake in Sichuan, an official with the torch relay department of the Beijing Organising Committee said today.
The relay schedule has already been changed after the withdrawal of Taiwan last year to accommodate last week's three days of national mourning for the earthquake and to shift the Sichuan leg from next month to August 3rd-5th.
A separate Olympic flame visited Tibet earlier this month for an ascent of Mount Everest.