Another earthquake hits Afghanistan days after prior quake killed 2,400 persons

Days after a powerful earthquake killed more than 2,400 people and completely destroyed towns, another one has struck a region of Afghanistan.

The Herat province’s capital, Herat, is located in western Afghanistan. The magnitude 6.3 earthquake that occurred on Wednesday was six miles deep and was located around 17 miles from Herat.

It has injured at least 80 people and a landslide has blocked the major Herat-Torghondi highway, Information Ministry spokesman Abdul Wahid Rayan said.

It also flattened all 700 homes in Chahak village, which was untouched by the tremors of previous days, although no deaths had yet been reported as residents evacuated in the wake of the earlier quake.

An earthquake on Saturday and subsequent tremors killed more than 2,400 across Herat province.

In Naib Rafi, a village that previously had about 2,500 residents, people said almost no one was still alive besides men who were working outside when the quake struck.

Survivors worked all day with excavators to dig long trenches for mass burials.

READ ALSO:Another earthquake hits western Afghanistan

On a barren field in the district of Zinda Jan, a bulldozer removed mounds of earth to clear space for a long row of graves.

“It is very difficult to find a family member from a destroyed house and a few minutes to later bury him or her in a nearby grave, again under the ground,” said Mir Agha, from the city of Herat, who had joined hundreds of volunteers to help the locals.

Nearly 2,000 houses in 20 villages were destroyed, the Taliban have said. The area hit by the quakes has just one government-run hospital.

On Tuesday, UN deputy spokesman Farhan Haq said Zinda Jan was the worst-affected area, with more than 1,300 people killed and nearly 500 people still reported missing.

He said UN satellite imagery also indicated extreme levels of destruction in the district of Injil.

“Our humanitarian colleagues warn that children are particularly vulnerable and have suffered severe psychological distress from the earthquake,” he said.

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