Afghanistan earthquake death toll rises
At least four people were killed and 20 others wounded in an earthquake that hit northern Afghanistan last night, an opposition spokesman said today.
The 4.9 magnitude quake reduced more than 50 mud and brick houses to rubble in Parwan province on Friday, Wasiuddin Salik, a spokesman for the opposition alliance said.
Initial reports said only two women were killed and one was injured when the roof of their house collapsed in a remote northern district of Parwan. But villagers overnight found two more bodies buried under the rubble in a nearby village, Salik said.
The quake’s epicentre was in the Hindu Kush mountain range, barely 48 miles north of the capital Kabul.
The opposition soldiers carried out relief work and opened a strategic road early today connecting Parwan with Panjshir another stronghold of the opposition, he said.
The opposition, which controls barely 5% of the territory in northern Afghanistan, is fighting a bloody civil war against the ruling Taliban militia.
The Taliban, who are mostly Sunni Muslims and Pashtun, the country’s majority ethnic group, rule roughly 95% of Afghanistan, including the capital Kabul.
The opposition comprises mostly of ethnic and religious minorities.
