Rescuers scramble to deliver aid to earthquake survivors
Afghanistan and Pakistan are scrambling to get aid to survivors of this week’s magnitude-7.5 earthquake as the region’s death toll from the tremor rose to 385.
Pakistan’s disaster management authority said the nation’s figure stands at 267, with 220 killed in north-western Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and 47 elsewhere in the country.
Afghanistan has reported 115 dead, while three people died on the Indian side of the disputed region of Kashmir.
Casualty figures are likely to leap once relief workers return from remote villages that can be accessed only by foot or donkey.
The quake, which struck on Monday, was centred in Afghanistan’s sparsely populated Badakhshan province bordering Pakistan, Tajikistan and China.
In battered north-western Pakistan, more than 10,000 homes were damaged, as well as 147 schools.
Funerals are continuing and in Pakistan’s worst-hit town of Shangla, residents have demanded government help to rebuild homes.
