MAanila, Philappines - Mourning for the late Pope John Paul II transcended religious barriers in Asia with flags lowered to half mast from Hindu India to Australia, Buddhist Thailand to the staunchly Catholic Philippines.
Special masses were held at churches across the region -- including communist countries China and Vietnam where religious freedom is repressed and whose leaders have long been at odds with the Vatican -- while tributes from leaders of all faiths continued to pour in.
In India the national flag flew at half mast and all official entertainment was cancelled as the country entered the second day of three days' official state mourning and special masses were held in churches across the country.
Christians make up about two percent of India's billion plus Hindu-majority population, but the pontiff is widely esteemed there for putting Mother Teresa -- the nun who devoted her life to helping Calcutta's dirt poor slum-dwellers -- on the path to sainthood in 2003, just six years after her death.
In predominantly Buddhist Thailand flags will remain lowered until Tuesday at government buildings, while in Australia flags on Sydney's iconic Harbour Bridge were also flying half-mast Monday.
New South Wales state Premier Bob Carr said his government wanted to honour the pontiff who died Saturday at the age of 84 after 26 years as head of the Catholic Church.
"As Head of State of the Vatican, His Holiness will be accorded the protocol of a Head of State," Carr said, adding that the flags would also be lowered on the day chosen for the pope's funeral.
Asia's biggest Catholic country, the Philippines, Monday began official mourning, while President Gloria Arroyo annonced she would be attending the pontiff's funeral in Rome this week.
The country, which has some 68 million catholics, would remain in a national period of mourning and flags will fly at half-mast until the Pope was buried, Arroyo's chief aide, Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, said.
"In my visits to the pope even before I became president, what always impressed me was he knew what was happening in the Philippines," Arroyo told reporters.
"He was most especially concerned with having peace, progress, and brotherhood in Mindanao," she said, referring to the southern Philippine region that has been a hotbed of Muslim separatism for decades.
In tiny East Timor, the independent former Indonesian territory which is 90 percent Catholic, Prime Minister Mari Alkatiri said a statue honouring the pope would be constructed in the Tasi Tolo district of the capital Dili, the scene of the pope's main appearance in the city during his 1989 visit. The nation is also observing three days of mourning.
Roman Catholics only make up about five percent of Indonesia's mostly Muslim 214 million population, but special masses were held at churches, as they were in China and Vietnam.
With tears streaming down their faces, expatriate and Chinese worshippers attended mass from shortly after dawn at the nearly full Southern Cathedral, a centuries-old church in the heart of Beijing.
"The pope's biggest contribution was to promote world peace with his travels. It's very sad he couldn't visit China," said an elderly worshipper, surnamed Yang.
But in a reflection of how religious freedom is still not guaranteed in China, young men in black suits and ties appearing to be officials were recording scenes from the Southern Cathedral with camcorders.
China severed diplomatic relations with the Vatican in 1951.
Beijing has since allowed Catholics to only worship in the state-sanctioned Church and insisted on having a say in appointing bishops -- a condition unacceptable to the Holy See and which has driven underground a strong section of Chinese Catholics which remains loyal to the Vatican.
In Hong Kong, now a semi-autonomous part of China but which allows religious freedom, a requiem mass led by Bishop Joseph Zen was to be held at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception Monday night at 8pm. About 1,500 people are expected to attend, including Hong Kong's caretaker leader Donald Tsang, a devout Catholic who Sunday hailed the pontiff as "a role model for all of us."
Catholic churches in predominantly Buddhist Singapore and in Taiwan also held special services.
Media around Asia heaped praise on the pontiff for pursuing peace and bridging the divide between faiths, though some reflected his legacy would be mixed.
"He believed in the power of the Christian faith to make a difference in the modern world," but "he battled with advocates of change: those who wanted women to be ordained, or proposed that priestly celibacy be optional, or argued for same-sex marriages, or campaigned for the uses of contraception, or promoted the right to choose," said the Philippine Daily Inquirer.
Hong Kong's South China Morning Post noted "his support for democracy and human rights contrasts with John Paul's conservative - and quite autocratic - approach to the Church. He centralised power and did not tolerate dissent".
In mostly Confucian South Korea, the Korea Times said the pope had exerted a profound influence on religious and secular life. His successor "should inherit the late pontiff's untiring efforts for global peace and his adamant opposition to war," it said.