VATICAN CITY, April 9 (AFP) – The Roman Catholic Church has nine days of mourning before electing a new pope, after an emotional funeral yesterday for John Paul II, attended by one million people and watched by countless others around the world.

Pope John Paul II was laid to rest in Saint Peter’s basilica, buried in the crypt close to the spot said to contain the remains of Peter, the apostle chosen by Jesus Christ to found his church almost 2,000 years ago.

The burial inaugurated a nine-day period of mourning for the Polish-born pontiff, who died April 2 at age 84 after a 26-year reign, the third longest in history.

On April 18, Roman Catholic cardinals are to meet behind closed doors to start the process of electing his successor.

About 300,000 mourners thronged in and around Saint Peter’s Square, where the pope’s body lay in a plain wooden coffin during the mass attended by the political and religious leaders of more than half the world’s nations.

An estimated 700,000 other pilgrims filled surrounding streets to watch the ceremony on giant video screens.

At one point the crowd interrupted the mass with calls for the immediate canonisation of the pope.

Banners reading “Santo Subito” (sainthood at once) were hoisted amid a sea of red-and-white Polish flags, prompting mourners to break into a chant of “Santo, Santo” lasting about seven minutes.

During his homily, the officiating priest, Germany’s Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, said John Paul II had borne “a burden which transcends merely human abilities”.

Recalling how the pope had appeared at a window in the Vatican to bless believers on Easter Sunday, six days before his death, when he could no longer speak, the cardinal said:

“Our pope never wanted to spare his own life, but gave himself unreservedly for Christ until his last moment … now we can be sure that our beloved pope is at the window of God’s house, where he sees and blesses us.”

Ratzinger said the funeral was “full of sadness, yet at the same time of joyful hope and profound gratitude.”

World leaders, including UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and US President George W Bush, sat on the left-hand side of the esplanade in serried ranks of mourning black.

Bush later told reporters on the plane taking him back to Washington that attending the funeral was “one of the highlights of my presidency”.

He said he had been particularly moved by the final moments of the ceremony, when “the plain-looking casket (was) carried and held up for the seal to be seen and then the sun pouring down.”.

President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva of Brazil, the largest Catholic country, was also present, as were French President Jacques Chirac and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who broke off campaigning for the May 5 general election to fly to Rome.

On the other side of the altar sat red-robed cardinals. Vatican Swiss guards in yellow and purple uniforms and scarlet-plumed helmets stood by while Catholic bishops in purple sat beside prelates of the Eastern Orthodox Church.

An open red-bound New Testament was placed on top of the coffin, its pages riffling in the wind.

The vast crowd began by applauding the arrival of the casket, but many began weeping while the Sistine Chapel choir sang Gregorian chants.

The mass, celebrated on the wind-swept square under a cloudy sky, was broadcast live and watched by hundreds of millions of television viewers worldwide.

In the southern Polish city of Krakow, where Karol Wojtyla served as archbishop before being elected pope in 1978, about 800,000 people gathered in a field to follow the funeral broadcast live on giant screens, local police said.

Thousands more gathered at Luneta Park in Manila, capital of the Philippines, Asia’s biggest Roman Catholic nation.