ISLAMABAD/KABUL: At least nine people were killed and 44 injured in northwest Pakistan as a strong earthquake jolted many parts of the country on Tuesday evening.
The United States Geological Survey said the magnitude 6.5 quake was centred in the Hindu Kush mountains, near the Jurm village in northeastern Afghanistan, but the depth of 187 kilometres mitigated extensive damage.
The quake, which struck around 09:30 pm on Tuesday and lasted more than 30 seconds, was felt from central Asia to New Delhi in India — more than 2,000 km away.
It was felt by some 285 million people in Pakistan, India, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan, the European-Mediterranean Seismological Centre said.
“It was a powerful earthquake and we feared maximum damage due to the intensity — that’s why we issued an alert,” Bilal Faizi, a spokesman for Pakistan’s emergency Rescue 1122 service in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, told AFP.
“But fortunately our fears proved wrong. Residents panicked due to the magnitude of the earthquake, but the damage was minimal”.
Senior provincial official Abdul Basit said that in addition to the dead and injured, at least 19 houses were damaged.
Khudadad Heights, a vast multi-storey residential block in Islamabad, was evacuated after huge cracks appeared in the building.
“The children started shouting that there is an earthquake. We all ran out. The horrors of the earthquake in Turkey and neighbouring countries had a strong effect on our nerves,” said Ikhlaq Kazmi, a retired professor in the Pakistani city of Rawalpindi.
Officials in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa said nine people had been killed in the quake, including two women and two children.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif ordered the National Disaster Management Authority to be ready to deal with any emergency.
Reports from different parts of the country said tremors were felt in several cities, including Islamabad, Peshawar, Charsadda, Lahore, and Rawalpindi. After the earthquake, frightened people fled their homes and came out in the open.
At least 180 people, who suffered minor injuries, were taken to hospitals across the K-P, Shahidullah Khan, a senior government official, told AFP.
Police officer Shafiullah Gandapur in Swat said that a 13-year-old girl died when a wall of her house collapsed, while 150 people were injured across the district. He added that an emergency had been declared at the hospitals in the district.
The PDMA in Punjab said that more than 18 districts were jolted but no loss of life was reported. However, a PDMA spokesperson said that cracks had appeared in some high-rise buildings in Rawalpindi.
Panicked residents of cities and towns in Afghanistan and Pakistan also fled their homes to seek safety away from buildings — with many too scared to return.
In Afghanistan, officials reported four dead and 50 injured — but phone and internet links to remote parts of the country had been severed and communication patchy.
Government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said health centres across the country had been put on high alert.
In the Afghan capital Kabul, shopkeeper Noor Mohammad Hanifi set up tents in the street for his family to spend the night in.
“Nobody dares to go inside their homes,” Hanifi told AFP as his family, cloaked in blankets, took shelter.
“We stayed the night in our courtyard… it was cold outside, but we preferred to stay out rather than go back,” 24-year-old student Neda Raihan told AFP in Kabul.
Many families were out of their homes celebrating Nowruz, the Persian New Year, when the quake struck.
“I heard people screaming and yelling as they came out in the streets,” said Masieh, who was outside with his family when the tremor hit.
Afghanistan is in the grips of a humanitarian disaster made worse by the Taliban takeover of the country in August 2021.
International development funding on which the country relied dried up after the takeover and assets held abroad were frozen.
Large parts of South Asia are seismically active because a tectonic plate known as the Indian plate is pushing north into the Eurasian plate. A 6.1 magnitude earthquake in eastern Afghanistan killed more than 1,000 people last year. In 2005, at least 73,000 people were killed by a 7.6 magnitude quake that struck northern Pakistan.
