AFGHANISTAN: Severe aftershocks have hampered rescue efforts in Afghanistan's earthquake and caused many survivors to spend a third night outside in freezing temperatures.
As the interim Afghan leader, Mr Hamid Karzai, flew to the stricken region about 105 miles north of the capital Kabul, the UN said 1,200 people had been confirmed dead so far.
About 1,500 homes have been destroyed, 4,000 people injured and 20,000 left without shelter, according to the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Affairs. But Afghan officials continue to insist the death toll is as high as 2,000.
Aid workers estimate that up to 30,000 people were made homeless when their mud-brick houses were destroyed in Monday evening's earthquake. According to the Red Cross, about 500 of the 730 bodies recovered from the rubble have already been buried.
The death toll could rise further when other isolated villages in this mountainous region of the Hindu Kush are visited. At present, access to many areas is blocked by minefields remaining from the civil war between the Taliban and the Northern Alliance.
Afghan officials had initially estimated the number of dead at between 2,000 and 5,000, but the UN has since revised this number downwards. No foreigners are believed to be among the dead.
Throughout yesterday, residents searched the rubble of the worst-affected town of Nahrin. Hundreds of volunteers dug through mounds of dirt, mud and debris, government officials said. Survivors pulled belongings out of their destroyed homes, some of which were reduced to piles of dust.
In Nahrin and its surrounding villages, 25 per cent of houses have been to destroyed, and a further 60 per cent badly damaged.
During his visit to Nahrin, Mr Karzai declared today a national day of mourning and told survivors, "All the people of Afghanistan share your pain. "
The people of Nahrin were very, very brave. They haven't asked for much," he added. However, villagers interrupted, shouting that they had no water or electricity and were in dire need of help.
Aid has begun to arrive in the affected area in large quantities. The Red Cross has sent 400 first-aid kits and aid agencies have sent medical teams and tents.
The international security force in Kabul dispatched a Chinook helicopter to Nahrin on Tuesday. The aircraft transported a tonne of emergency medical kits from the World Health Organisation to the quake zone.
Rescue workers say there is no shortage of food supplies, but shelter materials are urgently needed. With no airstrip in the region, aid has to make the long journey from Kabul or Mazar- e-Sharif by road.
The Pakistan government has said it is confident that fugitives Osama bin Laden and the Taliban leader, Mullah Mohammed Omar, are not in the country, and it will not allow US troops to look for them there.
The Interior Minister, Mr Moinuddin Haider, said Pakistan had good control of its western border with Afghanistan and good co-operation with the semi-autonomous tribesman living there.
As a result, neither bin Laden nor Mullah Omar could have found refuge in Pakistan, he said, rebutting suggestions that US troops might need to cross into Pakistan to look for them.
"The Pakistani tribesmen living on this side of the Pakistan/Afghan border are very clear. They will not like to take the risk of harbouring anybody," he said.
Meanwhile, European Commission President Mr Romano Prodi has said he was deeply worried by the prospect of war with Iraq and that the EU was divided and unaware of US plans.
Mr Prodi also told Britain's New Statesman magazine that international support for Washington's war on terro was fraying at the edges, undermined by rising Palestinian-Israeli violence. - (Reuters)
