East Afghanistan: Over 1,000 people have been killed and at least 1,500 injured by a strong earthquake that struck Afghanistan. Early on Wednesday morning (21:01 GMT Tuesday), when many were asleep, a massive 6.1 earthquake shook the country’s east.
There have been at least 1,500 recorded injuries, but officials fear that number is sure to climb because many families were sleeping in fragile homes when the earthquake struck. Since most of the homes in the area are made of weather-sensitive materials, such as mud and wood, and because the earthquake coincided with unusually heavy rains, there was an increased danger of disaster.
The most urgent immediate requirements, according to experts and officials, are food, drink, clothes, shelter, and commodities for the displaced as well as medical care and conveyance for the injured.
The UN has sent essential care and dispatched mobile health teams to Afghanistan, but it has issued a warning that neither it nor the region’s neighbours have enough relief and recovery abilities.
According to Ramiz Alakbarov, the UN’s Deputy Special Representative for Afghanistan, Turkey is the nation best suited to help. He stated that the Turkish Embassy in Afghanistan was “waiting for the formal request.“The Turkish Red Crescent, which has operations in Afghanistan, has dispatched supplies for the casualties, according to a statement from the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Wednesday.
A Taliban official said on Thursday that aircraft and vehicles delivering supplies including medication, tents, and tarpaulins had also arrived from Pakistan, Iran, and Qatar.
“The country is reeling from the effects of decades of conflict, protracted severe drought, the effects of other intense climate-related disasters, extreme economic hardship, a battered health system, and system-wide gaps,” said the IFRC on Wednesday, calling for more global support.
According to Alakbarov, $15 million in help is required to deal with the crisis; but, when more information about the scenario on the ground comes in, this amount is likely to keep growing.
Alakbarov stated that “our crews do not have particular tools to retrieve victims from under the rubble.” I don’t have the specific information on how well placed they are to handle and deliver such apparatus to these mountainous places, so this has to depend mostly on the attempts of the de facto administration, which also has some limits in that regard.
