ISLAMABAD: The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) dispatched five trucks loaded with 105 tons of essential relief supplies to earthquake-affected regions of Afghanistan.
Each truck carried a 40-foot container packed with critical humanitarian aid, including ration bags, tents, blankets, sleeping mats and medicines. The convoy crossed into Afghanistan via the Torkham border, aiming to provide immediate support to communities devastated by the recent seismic activity.
A departure ceremony was held at the NDMA warehouse in Islamabad, with the Minister of State for Religious Affairs and Interfaith Harmony, Kesoo Mal Kheal Das Kohistani, as the chief guest. The event was also attended by senior officials from the National Disaster Management Authority and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Pakistan dispatched essential relief supplies to support earthquake-affected communities in Afghanistan on the directives of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.
One of Afghanistan’s worst earthquakes killed more than 800 people and injured at least 2,800, authorities said on Monday, as rescuers struggled to reach remote areas due to rough mountainous terrain and inclement weather.
The disaster will further stretch the resources of the war-torn nation’s Taliban administration, already grappling with crises ranging from a sharp drop in foreign aid to deportations of hundreds of thousands of Afghans by neighbouring countries.
Sharafat Zaman, spokesperson for the health ministry in Kabul, called for international aid to tackle the devastation wrought by the quake of magnitude 6 that struck around midnight local time, at a depth of 10 km (6 miles).
“We need it because here lots of people lost their lives and houses,” he told Reuters.
The quake killed 812 people in the eastern provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar, administration spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.
Ziaul Haq Mohammadi, a student at Al-Falah University in the eastern city of Jalalabad, was studying in his room at home when the quake struck. He said he tried to stand up but was knocked over by the power of the tremor.
“We spent the whole night in fear and anxiety because at any moment another earthquake could happen,” Mohammadi said.
Rescuers were battling to reach remote mountainous areas cut off from mobile networks along the Pakistani border, where mudbrick homes dotting the slopes collapsed in the quake.
“The area of the earthquake was affected by heavy rain in the last 24-48 hours as well, so the risk of landslides and rock slides is also quite significant – that is why many of the roads are impassable,” Kate Carey, an officer at the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA), told Reuters.
Rescue teams and authorities are trying to dispose of animal carcasses quickly so as to minimise the risk of contamination to water resources, Carey said.
Also read: Afghanistan earthquake death toll reaches 800, over 2,800 injured
