An earthquake measuring at least 7,6 on the Richter scale caused massive devastation on Saturday across a swathe of Pakistan, India and Afghanistan, leaving thousands of people feared dead.
The quake struck close to the dividing line between the Indian- and Pakistani-controlled zones of the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir, triggering deadly landslides that wiped out whole villages.
The confirmed death toll in the earthquake has passed 1Â 000, officials said.
In Pakistan’s North West Frontier province alone, the toll is above 550, said Riffat Pasha, the provincial head of police.
”The death toll is between 550 and 600 in North West Frontier province and it is likely to rise,” he said. ”There is massive devastation in several areas. The roads are blocked and it will take us anther 24 hours to uncover more details. These are just initial figures.”
Another police official said more than 500 people died in the province’s remote districts of Mansehra and Malakand.
”We still do not have any full death count, but the reports sent by different police stations say between 500 and 600 people have died,” Mansehra police official Mohammad Asghar said.
About 250 people are confirmed dead and thousands more injured in Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistan-controlled Kashmir, a government official said.
”There is massive devastation in the city,” he said.
In India, officials said at least 175 people have been killed.
”The death toll could be in the thousands. The devastation is massive,” said Pakistan’s chief military spokesperson, Major General Shaukat Sultan.
”Village after village has been wiped out” in Pakistani Kashmir, an army relief official said from Muzaffarabad. ”The Neelum River has been blocked because whole villages have fallen into the water.”
‘Strongest quake in 100 years’
The temblor sent people fleeing their homes in areas more than 1Â 000km apart, from the western Pakistani desert city of Quetta to Kunduz in the mountains of northern Afghanistan.
”This is the strongest quake in the last 100 years in this region,” the chief of Pakistan’s meteorological department, Qamar Uzzman, said.
Pakistani military spokesperson Major General Shaukat Sultan said several villages in Kashmir have been totally ”wiped out” and that troops and helicopters have been scrambled to reach the stricken areas.
Indian army spokesperson P Sehgal said many soldiers in the Indian-controlled zone of Kashmir died when their positions caved in along the Line of Control, the heavily militarised de facto border that divides Kashmir’s Indian and Pakistani zones.
The quake also brought down buildings in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, including the 10-storey Margalla Towers where rescuers used bare hands to claw through rubble to reach blood-stained people trapped under huge stone slabs.
Shaken from sleep, residents faced quake horror
In Islamabad, reports Farooq Naeem, terrified residents of a 10-storey apartment block in the heart of the city fled to their balconies in a futile bid to escape before the building came crashing down.
”We all rushed out of our houses. People were in their pyjamas and many women there were without slippers and without their dopatta [Muslim scarf],” said Sajida Burki, who lives in a nearby tower that was untouched.
”We saw people rushing to a balcony on the other building, but while it was still rocking, it crashed down and the occupants came down with the mass of the concrete.”
At 8.50am (3.50am GMT) on Saturday, many people living in the upscale Margalla Towers apartment block in Islamabad were enjoying the chance to sleep in after a hectic working week.
Minutes later, the monster earthquake had transformed the plush building to a heap of rubble and twisted metal.
Afterwards, dust-covered survivors could be seen pinned under huge concrete slabs. Cries for help floated from the wreckage, as people used their bare hands to claw through the debris.
”There were screams of women and children, many are still trapped inside and we can hear cries. It’s a tragic scene,” Burki said.
”I have just seen another body being pulled out. The place is devastated,” said a photographer for news agency AFP at the scene.
Many foreigners — including Japanese, Italians and Arabs — rented apartments there because they were considered relatively safe and secure.
‘Test’ for Pakistan
Emergency services rushed to the scene and people living nearby set up voluntary relief centres in a public park facing the towers to help people with minor injuries.
The city’s police and administration chiefs appealed to local businesses to bring metal cutters, cranes and heavy machinery to help. They have also asked construction experts for assistance.
One resident, Amanullah Khan, said the complex had a parking lot in the basement and authorities were therefore not taking heavy cranes too close, in case the structure collapsed further.
Pakistan’s military ruler President Pervez Musharraf visited the disaster site. Clambering over the rubble in his military uniform, he said the quake is a test for the nation.
”In the overall context it is a test for all of us … the entire nation, and we are sure we will qualify this test,” Musharraf said.
Minutes later, an aftershock of 6,3 rocked the capital, once again sending people running on to the streets of the capital in fear. — AFP
