Earthquakes in Pakistan!

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Posted: 20 years ago
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Hundreds killed in Kashmir quake
Residents search the wreckage of an Islamabad tower block


Pakistan says more than 1,000 people may have died in a powerful quake that also hit north India and Afghanistan. The quake in Kashmir had a magnitude of at least 7.6. The epicentre was 80km (50 miles) north-east of Islamabad. Pakistan's interior ministry said several villages had been wiped out. A total of 172 are so far confirmed dead in Indian-administered Kashmir. Rescuers are trying to reach dozens of residents feared trapped in collapsed buildings in Islamabad. Residents in the Afghan capital, Kabul, and India's capital, Delhi, are also reported to have felt the tremor. Aftershocks Maj Gen Shaukat Sultan, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's spokesman, said: "Casualties will be high... they could be well over 1,000. "It is a national tragedy," he said. Interior Minister Aftab Sherpao told local television: "We have reports that several entire villages have been wiped out."
HAVE YOUR SAY
Those moments were really very terrifying, everything looked like it was moving and every building looked as if it was going to collapse
Maqsood Minhas, Sialkot, Pakistan

The BBC's Zaffar Abbas in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, says aftershocks were being felt there and people were still out on the streets, afraid to go back into their homes. Two buildings of the Margalla Towers residential complex collapsed in the city. The BBC's Barbara Plett at the scene says there is a small hill of broken concrete over which and under which rescue workers are desperately trying to dig out survivors. Government official, Mohammad Ali, told Reuters: "I just cannot say how many people are still under there and we are trying to evacuate them. "Over 75 apartments were affected so the number of people is in the hundreds."
Rescuers in Islamabad
Pakistani officials fear the death toll nationwide could be very high
Oxfam has confirmed there is also "massive destruction" in Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province. Ben Phillips of Oxfam told the BBC a meeting of relief organisations was under way and is liaising with the UN and the Pakistani government on supplying aid. Mr Phillips said the initial requirement would be for tents, blankets, food aid and medical supplies. Mohammad Hanif, an official at the Pakistan Meteorological Department, told Reuters: ""We can say that it was one of the strongest earthquakes [ever] felt in Islamabad." In Indian-administered Kashmir, 157 civilians and 15 soldiers are confirmed dead and more than 600 people injured. The town of Uri close to the Line of Control that separates divided Kashmir was worst hit, with 104 dead. In other reports around the region:
    About 35 people were feared dead when a courtroom and two schools collapsed in Muzaffarabad, Pakistan-controlled Kashmir, police said. A meeting attended by India's premier, Manmohan Singh, in the northern city of Chandigarh was stopped after his bodyguards ordered an immediate evacuation following the tremors. The 200-year-old Moti Mahal fort in Poonch district, Indian-administered Kashmir, has collapsed. Haikal Shah Falah, a government employee in Jalalabad, eastern Afghanistan, said: "We've reports that two children were killed, one in Charbag and one in Chapliyar districts."
  • One child was killed and six injured in a school collapse in Rawalpindi, Pakistan's information minister said.
www.bbc.co.uk

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Posted: 20 years ago
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let's pray for them

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