JALALABAD (PAN, on Wednesday afternoon.
The casualties occurred in Nangarhar and Kunar provinces as a result of the 5.7 magnitude quake that was 40 miles deep, with its epicentre located in the Mehtarlam mountain range 16 miles northwest of Jalalabad.
The tremor was also felt as far away as northern Pakistan at a depth of 70 kilometres.
In Kabul, the Ministry of Public Health said it had received a report from Nangarhar regarding injuries to 105 people. Sixty-eight of the wounded were taken to the main provincial hospital and 38 others to district health centres.
Nangyalai Yousafzai, the Afghan Red Crescent chief for Nangarhar, told Pajhwok Afghan News 14 people had been killed and dozens wounded in the province.
Six of the deaths happened in Jalalabad and the rest in Lalpura, Khewa, Kama, Dara and Goshta districts, he said, citing information from Red Crescent volunteers.
But Ahmad Zia Abdulzai, the governor’s spokesman, put the quake toll at six dead and 75 wounded. The deaths were reported from Kama, Surkhrod and Lalpura districts.
Most of the wounded were evacuated to the Nangarhar Civil Hospital and district clinics. Civil Hospital Director confirmed receiving 63 of the injured. Forty of them were discharged after being administered first aid.
At least one person was killed in neighbouring Kunar, according to Wasifullah Wasifi, the governor’s spokesman. Hundreds houses and one mosque were damaged by the tremor in Kunar, Nangarhar and Laghman.
Earthquakes frequently rattle Afghanistan, especially in the Hindu Kush mountain range located near the juncture of the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates.
A 6.6 magnitude earthquake killed nearly 200 people in southwest China last week — days after 35 people were left dead by a strong tremor in Pakistan near the border with Iran.
In Pakistan, many cities of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab, including Nowshera, Murree, Lahore, Waziristan, Charsadda, Malakand, Swat, Chitral, Azad Kashmir, experienced the shock waves.
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