The official death toll from the earthquake in Christchurch rose 123 Saturday morning and was set to climb further over the weekend, officials said in New Zealand, dpa reported.
Superintendent Dave Cliff confirmed at a press conference the toll had risen by ten overnight with bodies still being found in the rubble and 200 people listed as missing after the 6.3 magnitude earthquake devastated parts of New Zealand's second largest city on Tuesday.
No one has been rescued alive since Wednesday afternoon but the 700 search and rescue experts scouring ruined buildings said they are still hoping to find survivors.
Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee also told the media that around one-quarter of buildings in Christchurch's CBD would have to be demolished because they were unsafe and could not be rebuilt.
This would mean the central business district would be closed for "some months at best", and this could mean Christchurch might not be able to host Rugby world games scheduled for later this year.
"We've got to be realistic about this prospect (losing the World Cup) but it's too early to be talking about it today," Brownlee said.
Engineers are working their way through the city and its suburbs assessing damage.
So far 4,600 structures have been given the all clear. About 500 properties have been declared unsafe with only limited access while 341 were declared so dangerous they had to evacuated immediately.
Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker said entire blocks of the central business district would have to be demolished.
"We will have to prune this city and we'll have to prune it hard," Parker told Sky News.
"But we will rebuild this place - some people are saying 'Why not walk away?'. But life's not like that."
Two more people were arrested overnight for looting. The police presence was bolstered by 300 colleagues from Australia and hundreds more military personnel.
Electricity has been restored to 80 per cent of the city and water to 50 per cent, but the local council says damage to essential infrastructure is severe and will take a long time to fix.
Brownlee said the cost of rebuilding his hometown after two major earthquakes in six months would exceed 7 billion US dollars.
The Christchurch Chamber of Commerce said it believed the figure would be closer to 20 billion US dollars
The 7.1-magnitude earthquake in September resulted in 181,000 claims to the state-owned disaster insurer the Earthquake Commission and many of these will be revised with another 130,000 new claims expected.
On Wednesday, the New Zealand government declared the country's first national state of emergency.
It also announced Friday that the five-yearly census due to take place in early March had been cancelled.
Tuesday's quake, which struck at 12:51 pm (2351 GMT Monday) when office buildings and streets were full of people, was centred much closer to the surface and nearer to the city than the September quake that caused widespread damage but no fatalities.
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