Noboru Takeshita
President Corazon Aquino described the accident as "a national tragedy of harrowing proportions...[the Filipino people's] sadness is all the more painful because the tragedy struck with the approach of Christmas". Pope John Paul II, Japanese Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita and Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom conveyed their official messages of condolence. Given the estimated death toll, "Time" magazine and others have termed the sinking of "Doña Paz" "the deadliest peacetime maritime disaster of the 20th century".