More than 2,000 people died in a powerful earthquake that struck western Afghanistan on Saturday, causing enormous damage, according to a new official report released on Sunday.
The magnitude 6.3 earthquake that struck areas 30 kilometers northwest of the city of Herat on Saturday was followed by eight strong aftershocks.
“Unfortunately the number of victims is very high. The death toll is over 2,000,” Bilal Karimi, deputy spokesman for the Taliban government, told AFP. “We are waiting for the final numbers,” he continued.
Dozens of houses were destroyed in the village of Sarboland in the Zinda Jan district, an AFP journalist noted as night fell on Saturday.
Men cleared away rubble while women and children waited outside among the rubble.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), more than 600 houses were destroyed or partially damaged in at least twelve villages in Herat province. According to the same source, a total of 4,200 people were affected by the earthquake in one way or another.
“From the first shock, all the houses collapsed,” says Bashir Ahmad, 42. “Those who were in the houses were buried. There are families we have no news about,” he adds.
“Leaving with our martyrs”
Nek Mohammad was at work when the first earthquake struck Afghanistan at around 11:00 a.m. local time (6:30 a.m. GMT).
“We got home and realized there was nothing left. “Everything had turned to sand,” he explains, adding that around 30 bodies were found.
“At the moment we have nothing. No blankets or anything else. We are left alone with our martyrs,” adds this 32-year-old.
On Saturday, the World Health Organization (WHO) warned that “the number of casualties is expected to increase as search and rescue operations continue.”
In Herat, considered Afghanistan’s cultural capital, many residents and traders fled the buildings during the first quake.
The province of Herat, which according to the World Bank has a population of 1.9 million, has also been plagued by drought for years, crippling many farming communities that were already struggling.
Earthquakes are common in Afghanistan, particularly in the Hindu Kush mountains, near where the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates meet.
A magnitude 5.9 earthquake, the deadliest in Afghanistan in nearly 25 years, left more than a thousand dead and tens of thousands homeless in the poor Paktika province (southeast) in June 2022.
A magnitude 6.5 earthquake killed 13 people in Afghanistan and Pakistan last March near the city of Jurm in the northeast of the country.
Afghanistan has also already been in a serious humanitarian crisis since the Taliban came to power in 2021 and the subsequent withdrawal of international aid.