Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin flew into Kazan on Thursday, where he blamed "irresponsibility and greed" for a riverboat accident that has killed at least 113 people, including many children.
Twenty people were still missing from Russia's worst river disaster in three decades and were presumed dead as divers neared the end of their search of the boat that sank on Sunday, regional Emergencies Ministry official Igor Panshin said.
The tragedy, in which at least two dozen children have died, has angered ordinary Russians whose patience is wearing thin at the country's failure to shake off its Soviet legacy of corruption and systematic neglect.
Echoing their ire, Putin said: "It is horrible that irresponsibility, greed... and a crude violation of the basic safety requirements are the price we must pay."
Putin arrived in the Tatarstan region, of which Kazan is capital, four days after the tragedy.
Putin laid down crimson roses at the river port from where the doomed Bulgaria had departed. He was joined by Tatarstan's leader Rustam Minnikhanov.
The Bulgaria, a 79-meter river cruiser built in 1955, listed onto its right side during a thunderstorm and sank in minutes in a broad stretch of the Volga in Tatarstan, trapping many passengers inside.
Many such disasters in Russia are blamed on negligence and corruption despite tough talk from President Dmitry Medvedev and Putin, who had vowed when he was president between 2000 and 2008 to bring order with a "dictatorship of law."
Transport Minister Igor Levitin said 113 bodies had been found. Survivors have said up to 30 children had gathered in a recreation room on the boat shortly before it sank, and emergency officials have said divers saw many bodies of children in the room.
Fluffy toys and flowers were laid out on the embankment on Thursday while mourners lit candles.
Searchers have broadened the scope of their operation to an area stretching 190 km (120 miles) around the site.
'Who permitted this'
Prosecutors said the boat did not have a license to carry passengers and had a problem with its left engine when it set out for Kazan after taking passengers to a town down river on Saturday.
Putin ordered law enforcement agencies to investigate the disaster, and chided the firm that had leased the boat, whose director was ordered under arrest on Wednesday, along with a river transport inspector.
"How was a company without a tourism license allowed to let these boats go? Who permitted this? We need to analyze the regulations for this sector and introduce strict control," he said.
Emergency officials say the boat was meant for up to 140 people but that 208 were aboard.
Authorities plan to use a crane to raise the wreck of the Bulgaria from the riverbed in several days.