A new magnitude 6.3 earthquake struck the city of Herat in northwestern Afghanistan on Sunday, following several tremors in the region since the start of the month, including a devastating quake that killed more than a thousand people.
The shallow earthquake struck at 8:06 a.m. local time (03:36 GMT) on Sunday morning with an epicenter 33 kilometers from the city of Herat, the American Geophysics Institute (USGS) said.
According to the institute, an aftershock of magnitude 5.5 was recorded 20 minutes later.
The earthquake left at least 50 injured who were transported to a regional hospital in Herat, Mohammad Asif Kabir, a local rescue official, told AFP.
However, the injured were from the urban area and national disaster authorities said they were still assessing the impact of the quake closer to the epicenter.
A week after a deadly earthquake, most residents continue to sleep outside for fear of further tremors, according to an AFP journalist in Herat. But some returned to their homes for the night.
“The residents of Herat are panicking and afraid,” explains 27-year-old trader Hamid Nizami. “Thank God it happened during the day and people were awake.”
The tremors have increased in recent days
On October 7, a magnitude 6.3 earthquake destroyed entire villages in the Herat region.
The Taliban government estimated the death toll at more than a thousand. On Saturday evening, the World Health Organization (WHO) reported almost 1,400 deaths from this earthquake.
Another severe earthquake on October 11, whose epicenter was discovered around 30 kilometers north of Herat, caused panic among a traumatized population and left at least one dead and around a hundred injured.
UNICEF said on Wednesday that 90% of the victims of the first earthquake at the beginning of October were women and children.
“Women and children are often at home and take care of household chores and children. So if a building collapses, they are the most at risk,” Siddig Ibrahim, an agency official, told Portal. Herat.
According to the United Nations, at least six rural villages in Zenda Jan district were completely destroyed and more than 12,000 people were affected by the earthquakes.
The approaching winter could worsen the crisis
Since the tremors, thousands of people in the province have been sleeping outside, in cars, gardens or tents, while their homes have crumbled to dust.
But in this region, where nights are very cold, refugees cannot stay in tents for more than a month, humanitarian workers say.
Afghanistan is already suffering from a severe humanitarian crisis as foreign aid has largely been withdrawn since the Taliban returned to power.
For the Taliban authorities, who took power in August 2021 and have strained relations with international aid agencies, providing protection in large quantities will be a challenge as winter approaches.
Earthquakes are common in Afghanistan, particularly in the Hindu Kush Mountains, near the interface between the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates.
In June 2022, a magnitude 5.9 earthquake in the poor province of Paktika (southeast) left more than a thousand dead and tens of thousands homeless.