The Vatican was finalizing preparations on Friday for Pope Francis’s funeral, as the last wave of mourners passed through St. Peter’s Basilica to pay their respects at his open coffin.

Many of the 50 heads of state and 10 monarchs attending Saturday’s ceremony in St Peter’s Square, including US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky, are expected to arrive later Friday in Rome.

Italian and Vatican authorities have placed the area around St Peter’s under tight security with drones blocked, snipers on roofs and fighter jets on standby.

Further check-points will be activated on Friday night, police said.

Vast crowds of people on Friday morning packed Via della Conciliazione, the wide avenue leading to the Vatican, for the third and final day of the pope’s lying-in-state.

Over 128,000 people have already queued to pay their last respects to Francis, whose coffin will be closed at 8:00 pm (1800 GMT) in a ceremony attended by senior cardinals.

For a second night in a row, the Vatican kept St Peter’s open past the scheduled hours to accomodate the queues, only closing the doors between 2:30am (0030 GMT) and 5:40am Friday.

“Night is the most intimate moment, the Lord always manifests himself at night,” said Nicoletta Tomassetti, 60, who visited the Basilica in the very early hours of Friday morning.

“It was very emotional, in prayer, I asked the pope for some things and I know he will give them to me,” she told AFP.

The Catholic Church’s first Latin American pope died on Monday aged 88, less than a month after spending weeks in hospital with severe pneumonia.

Miracles Luna, a 74-year-old retired doctor from the Dominican Republic who attended the lying-in-state Thursday, said she thought he was “one of the best popes we have in the Catholic Church”.

“He was very merciful, identified with the people, poor people, so for me, for us he is the best one.”