A magnitude 5.6 earthquake struck Afghanistan’s remote south-eastern region on Thursday night, the third quake in six days, as the death toll from the first continued to rise.
The shallow quake hit at 20:56 local time (15:36 GMT) and sent people in Nangarhar and Kunar provinces scampering out of shelters in fear.
There was no immediate official report of casualties from Thursday night’s earthquake, but medics on the ground told the BBC that 17 wounded people were brought to Kunar Provincial Hospital.
Sunday’s quake has killed 1,368 people and wounded 2,180 others, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OHCA) said, citing reports from 25 villages.
The region’s rough and mountainous terrain continues to hamper rescue and disaster relief operations, the government said.
A second earthquake of magnitude 5.5 on Tuesday temporarily halted rescue operations, which have mostly been conducted by helicopters as debris from landslides cuts off access to remote villages.
There have also been a steady stream of aftershocks.
“Rescue and search efforts are still ongoing, tents have been set up for people in various areas, and the delivery of first aid and emergency supplies is ongoing,” Hamdullah Fitrat, deputy spokesman for the Taliban government, said on X.
The Taliban government – which is only recognised by Russia – has appealed for international help. The UN has released emergency funds, while the UK has pledged £1m ($1.3m) in aid.
Afghanistan is very prone to earthquakes because of its location on top of a number of fault lines where the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates meet.
In 2023, more than 1,400 people died after a series of 6.3-magnitude earthquakes hit western Afghanistan, near the city of Herat.
The year before that, a 5.9-magnitude earthquake struck eastern Afghanistan, killing at least 1,000 people and injuring another 3,000.
Rescuers have recovered hundreds of bodies from mountainous areas of southeastern Afghanistan, which was hit by a major earthquake at the weekend, taking the death toll to more than 2,200, according to a Taliban government spokesperson.
Previous estimates said some 1,400 people were killed. Taliban spokesperson Hamdullah Fitrat said on Thursday that the updated death toll was 2,205.
“Tents have been set up for people, and the delivery of first aid and emergency supplies is ongoing,” Fitrat said.
A third earthquake struck the region on Thursday, as search and rescue efforts were continuing. No new deaths have yet been reported after the magnitude 6.2 earthquake. Sunday’s quake was one of the deadliest in recent times due, in part, to how shallow it was, with its epicentre at a depth of about eight kilometres (five miles).
At least 3,640 people were injured in the magnitude 6 quake on Sunday and a subsequent magnitude 5.5 quake on Tuesday, the Taliban said, with the United Nations warning the death toll could rise as more people are still trapped under rubble, particularly in the worst-hit provinces of Kunar.
“What we’re seeing on the ground is utter devastation, a real catastrophe,” John Aylieff, country director for World Food Programme Afghanistan, told Al Jazeera on Thursday. “We have houses razed to the ground.”
Most of the casualties have been in Kunar province, where people typically live in wood and mud-brick houses along steep river valleys separated by high mountains.
More than 6,700 homes have been destroyed, authorities have said. Survivors are sifting through debris in their search for loved ones. The rough terrain is hindering relief efforts.
Taliban authorities have deployed helicopters and airdropped army commandos to help survivors. Aid workers have reported walking for hours to reach villages cut off by landslides and rockfall.
Obaidullah Stoman, 26, who travelled to the village of Wadir in Kunar’s Nugral district to search for a friend, told the AFP news agency that there was “only rubble left”.
“I’m searching here, but I didn’t see him. It was very difficult for me to see the conditions here,” he said.
Akhlaq, 14, who was injured and evacuated to the hospital, lost five members of his family to the earthquake in the remote village.
“We cannot accurately predict how many bodies might still be trapped under the rubble,” said Ehsanullah Ehsan, the head of disaster management for eastern Afghanistan’s Kunar region.
The World Food Programme has only enough supplies to last for a few weeks, Aylieff warned on Thursday, saying rescue teams are experiencing difficulty reaching remote villages affected by the earthquakes.
“Even our off-the-road trucks cannot get through, so we’re using every means possible, small pick-ups, pack animals, and even in some cases, villagers are coming down and carrying food back to the communities,” he told Al Jazeera.
[Al Jazeera]
Afghanistan has experienced devastating earthquakes in the past due to its location at the point where the Indian and Eurasian plates converge.
More than 2,000 people were killed in the western province of Herat in the country’s deadliest earthquake in October 2023. A year before, 1,000 people were killed after a magnitude 6.1 earthquake hit the eastern provinces of Paktika, Paktia, Khost, and Nangarhar.
A prohibition on contact between unrelated women and men meant many women’s wounds went untended and some were left trapped under rubble after a deadly earthquake, witnesses said.
The first rescue workers reached Bibi Aysha’s village more than 36 hours after an earthquake devastated settlements across eastern Afghanistan’s mountainous areas on Sunday. But instead of bringing relief, the sight of them heightened her fears; not a single woman was among them.
Afghan cultural norms, enforced even in emergencies by the ruling Taliban, forbid physical contact between men and women who are not family members. In the village of Andarluckak, in Kunar Province, the emergency team hurriedly carried out wounded men and children, and treated their wounds, said Ms. Aysha, 19. But she and other women and adolescent girls, some of them bleeding, were pushed aside, she said.
“They gathered us in one corner and forgot about us,” she said. No one offered the women help, asked what they needed or even approached them.
Tahzeebullah Muhazeb, a male volunteer who traveled to Mazar Dara, also in Kunar Province, said that members of the all-male medical team there were hesitant to pull women out from under the rubble of collapsed buildings. Trapped and injured women were left under stones, waiting for women from other villages to reach the site and dig them out.
“It felt like women were invisible,” said Mr. Muhazeb, 33. He added, “The men and children were treated first, but the women were sitting apart, waiting for care.”
If no male relative was present, he said, rescue workers dragged dead women out by their clothes, so as not to make skin contact.
More than 2,200 people died and 3,600 others were injured in the magnitude 6 quake that flattened countless hamlets and villages, according to figures released by Afghanistan’s government.
The response to the quake on Sunday has epitomized the dual standards that women and girls face in Afghanistan, aid groups and humanitarian organizations say, trapped both under the rubble and the weight of gender discrimination.
“Women and girls will again bear the brunt of this disaster, so we must ensure their needs are at the heart of the response and recovery,” the special representative for U.N. Women Afghanistan, Susan Ferguson, said in a statement this week.
Though the Taliban have not released a gender breakdown of the casualties, women have faced an especially harsh ordeal, made worse by neglect and isolation, more than half a dozen doctors, rescue workers and women in areas hit by the quake said in interviews.
Afghanistan faces a critical shortage of health care workers and, in particular, of women in that field. Last year, the Taliban imposed a ban on women’s enrollment in medical education. The dearth of female doctors and rescue workers has been all too evident in the wake of the earthquake.
Women and girls in Afghanistan face some of the world’s most severe restrictions under the Taliban, who took power four years ago and have remained unflinching, even as most of the Muslim world, countless human rights organizations and bodies like the World Bank have warned against the long-lasting effects of such policies on the country’s social fabric and economy.
Girls are prohibited from going to school beyond sixth grade. Women cannot travel far without a male companion and are barred from most jobs, including in nonprofits and humanitarian organizations. Afghan women working for U.N. agencies have facedrepeated harassment, culminating in threats so serious this year that the agencies instructed their female employees to temporarily work from home.
A New York Times journalist who reached the Mazar Dara area the day after the quake didn’t see any women among the medical, rescue or aid teams treating victims. In one district hospital visited, there were no female staff members.
When a trickle of nurses and humanitarian workers began reaching the affected areas by Tuesday, only a few were women. Soldiers followed them and prevented journalists from asking them questions or photographing them.
A spokesman for the Taliban-run Ministry of Health acknowledged that there was a lack of female health workers in the quake-ravaged areas.
“But in hospitals in Kunar, Nangarhar and Laghman, the largest number of female doctors and nurses are working, especially to treat earthquake victims,” Sharafat Zaman, the spokesman, said of the worst-hit provinces.
In Ms. Aysha’s village, not a single female aid worker had come as of Thursday, nearly four days after the earthquake, she said.She and her 3-year-old son had spent the past three nights out in the open, as rain that fell over the past few days prevented her from reaching a shelter or the city where her husband works.
“God saved me and my son,” Ms. Aysha said. “But after that night, I understood — being a woman here means we are always the last to be seen.”
Safiullah Padshah contributed reporting.
Fatima Faizi is a reporter in the Kabul, Afghanistan, bureau.
After Afghan Quake, Many Male Rescuers Aided Men but Not Women
A 4.7-magnitude earthquake struck eastern Afghanistan near Jalalabad, days after Kunar’s deadly tremors, deepening fears as survivors await aid amid ongoing devastation and blocked relief access.
At 9:40 a.m. local time on Thursday, September 4, another earthquake measuring 4.7 struck eastern Afghanistan, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
The epicenter was reported near Jalalabad in Nangarhar province, with the tremor occurring at a depth of 13 kilometers beneath the earth’s surface.
This comes just days after a series of deadly earthquakes devastated Kunar province, killing more than 1,400 people and leaving thousands injured and homeless.
Rescue operations in Kunar remain underway, with bodies still being recovered from rubble and aid agencies struggling to reach remote mountainous areas blocked by landslides.
The repeated tremors have heightened fears among survivors, many of whom are sheltering outdoors in makeshift camps as they await emergency relief.
So far, no official reports of casualties or damage have been released, and local authorities are still assessing the impact in surrounding districts.
International aid agencies, including the UN and Red Cross, have rushed support to affected regions, but access challenges and the scale of devastation continue to slow relief efforts.
Humanitarian groups warn that urgent assistance; food, shelter, and medical care—is critical to prevent a worsening crisis in Kunar, where the death toll and injuries remain staggering.
Fresh Tremor of Magnitude 4.7 Jolts Eastern Afghanistan
The 6.0 magnitude quake has killed over 1,400 people, officials said.
The earthquake that struck Afghanistan on Sunday has killed over 1,400 people, injured over 3,000 and destroyed several villages, according to officials.
The 6.0 magnitude quake — which was followed by a second 5.2 magnitude earthquake on Tuesday — also destroyed 8,000 houses, according to officials.
How to help after the Afghanistan earthquake
As officials begin rescue operations, charities and organizations have started to carry out support efforts. See below for a full list of ways to donate to charitable groups.
Below is more about each organization and links for more information.
Afghan Relief
An organization that is “committed to helping those in need across Afghanistan,” Afghan Relief said it has a team on the ground “working tirelessly to deliver emergency food, water, medical aid and shelter to those affected” by the quake.
The World Food Programme is a United Nations agency that is the “world’s largest humanitarian organization saving lives in emergencies and using food assistance to build a pathway to peace, stability and prosperity,” according to its website.
For those impacted by the Afghanistan quake, the agency said is is “rushing food to affected communities in eastern Afghanistan,” specifically delivering “high-energy biscuits to communities in quake-affected areas” and dispatching “mobile storage units to support broader emergency response,” the agency said in a press release on Monday.
Doctors Without Borders, a humanitarian organization that “provides medical assistance to people in crisis,” said it has an emergency team at the scene of the quake that is “assessing the full scale of the medical and humanitarian needs” and “delivering vital emergency trauma care supplies” to one of the main hospitals in the area, according to its website.
The organization said it is also coordinating with local authorities and other international health organizations to “assess how we may be able to provide medical support.”
The British Red Cross, a humanitarian charity dedicated to helping people around the world in emergencies, said it has trained volunteers “assisting in search and rescue missions” and in “distributing essentials like food and drinking water to those affected,” according to its website.
An organization that works in the United States and around the world to “give children a health start in life, the opportunity to learn and protection from harm,” Save the Children said it is sending health teams to areas impacted by the earthquake to treat children and their families, according to its website.
Additionally, the group said the teams will provide “clean, safe water to displaced families” and has materials for temporary shelters along with education and hygiene kits to distribute to children. Child protection teams are also “on hand to take care of children at risk,” the organization said.
The aftermath of the deadly earthquakes that hit Herat province in October 2023. The latest disaster is believed to have devastated hard-to-reach rural communities on the other side of the country.
After a magnitude six earthquake struck remote areas of eastern Afghanistan overnight reportedly killing at least 800 people and wiping out villages, UN chief António Guterres on Monday pledged to “spare no effort” in helping those affected.
“I stand in full solidarity with the people of Afghanistan after the devastating earthquake that hit the country earlier today,” the Secretary-General said in an online message.
“I extend my deepest condolences to the families of the victims and wish a speedy recovery to those injured. The UN team in Afghanistan is mobilized and will spare no effort to assist those in need in the affected areas.”
On the ground, several UN agencies reported devastation across four eastern provinces of Afghanistan including Nangarhar and Kunar, where staff and humanitarian partners are already supporting relief efforts.
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Hundreds of houses are believed to have collapsed in remote hillside communities, where many likely crumbled on top of others located on terraces further downhill.
“When an earthquake of this magnitude happens, the homes basically tumble on top of each other,” Salam Al-Jabani from the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF) told UN News. “And because it was so late at night, families were at home sleeping and that’s why we see such big losses.”
The UN Humanitarian Air Service has scheduled additional flights connecting Kabul and Jalalabad for personnel and cargo to scale up the response.
Trapped inside
Witnesses reported that the earthquake happened at around midnight local time, heightening fears that many Afghans may still be trapped under the rubble of their homes. UNICEF reported that many youngsters had been killed, as first responders said that poor phone and signal quality was impacting rescue and assessment activities.
The tremor’s epicentre is estimated to have been only around eight kilometres (six miles) underground, causing buildings to shake in the Afghan capital, Kabul, and in Pakistan’s capital city, Islamabad, according to reports.
“As reports of deaths and injuries from the #earthquake in eastern region of #Afghanistan continue to emerge, @WHOAfghanistan teams are on the ground in hospitals and health facilities, supporting the treatment of the wounded and assessing urgent health needs,” the UN health agency said.
“We are actively delivering essential medicines and supplies and deploying health teams to affected areas to help #SaveLives.”
Soundcloud
How the UN helps
United Nations teams are on the ground in more than 160 countries, working with the authorities and partners on joint programmes in communities to promote climate action, food security, gender equality and safety of civilians.
The UN has been present in Afghanistan since 1949; the global body’s work there is driven by the Resident Coordinator, Indrika Ratwatte, as head of a country team which includes around 20 UN agencies and international organizations such as the World Bank and Asian Development Bank.
Also on the ground to provide assistance, the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, noted that up more than 2,000 people have been likely injured in the province of Kunar alone. It is feared that the trading city of Jalalabad may have suffered a “very high death toll”, said UNHCR spokesperson Babar Baloch.
Help, before it’s too late
The UN agency is among those rushing lifesaving support to affected areas including medical equipment, shelter, clean water, tents and blankets. It underscored how the emergency has added “death and destruction” to Afghanistan’s many other existing human challenges that include drought and the return of millions of nationals from neighbouring countries.
Mr. Baloch insisted that the scale of this disaster “far exceeds the current capacity of local authorities and communities…We are appealing to the donor community globally to support urgently required relief efforts. Afghans need our support and assistance now, before it’s too late for many others.”
Aid teams will have to overcome challenging terrain to help some of the most remote communities who can only be reached on foot, OCHA noted.
It said that the de facto authorities have deployed heavy machinery to Nurgal and Chawkay districts to remove road blockages and that some sections have reportedly been reopened. Critically injured people have been airlifted by helicopter to Jalalabad and Asadabad hospitals which are now the main referral points for victims in Nangarhar and Kunar provinces.
But a number of isolated communities can only be reached by foot with travel time currently up to three hours from the point of obstruction, OCHA said, highlighting those in Dewagal Valley in Chawkay district and Mazar Valley in Nurgal district, Kunar province.
The earthquake is one of the worst to hit Afghanistan and comes less than two years since three deadly 6.3 magnitude quakes shook Herat on the other side of the country. They struck on 7, 11 and 15 October 2023, killing 1,480 people and injuring 1,950 others across 382 villages, creating widespread destruction.
Aid effort underway after Afghanistan quake ‘wipes out’ villages
At least 2,205 dead, over 3,600 injured, Taliban says
About 84,000 affected, thousands displaced, says aid agency
Some Kunar villages saw 98% of buildings destroyed or damaged
Funding cuts, Taliban policies worsen aid situation
KABUL/MAZAR DARA, Afghanistan, Sept 4 (Reuters) – Rescue workers on Thursday pulled bodies from the rubble of homes razed in Afghanistan’s earthquakes as the confirmed death toll topped 2,200, while homeless survivors faced a bleak future with global aid agencies warning of dwindling resources.
Search operations continued in the quake-hit mountainous eastern areas, the Taliban administration said, announcing a new death toll of 2,205 with at least 3,640 people injured.
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“Everything we had has been destroyed,” said Aalem Jan, whose house in the worst-affected province of Kunar was flattened by the tremors.
“The only remaining things are these clothes on our backs,” said Jan. His family sat under trees with their belongings piled next to them.
The first earthquake of magnitude 6, one of Afghanistan’s deadliest in recent years, unleashed widespread damage and destruction in the provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar on Sunday, when it struck at a shallow depth of 10 km (6 miles).
A second quake of magnitude 5.5 on Tuesday caused panic and interrupted rescue efforts as it sent rocks sliding down mountains and cut off roads to villages in remote areas.
A contour shake map of magnitude 6.0 earthquake struck \Afghanistan
More than 6,700 homes have been destroyed, authorities have said. The United Nations has warned the toll could rise with people still trapped under rubble as time runs out for survivors.
Humanitarian needs are “vast and growing rapidly”, said the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
“Up to 84,000 people are directly and indirectly affected, with thousands displaced,” it added, citing initial figures.
In some of the worst-affected villages in Kunar province, two out of three people had been killed or injured, while 98% of buildings were either destroyed or damaged by the tremors, according to an assessment by British-based charity Islamic Relief Worldwide.
Survivors desperately searching for family members sifted rubble, carried bodies on woven stretchers and dug graves with pickaxes in the wait for aid to arrive.
Video showed trucks, some laden with sacks of flour and others carrying men with shovels, travelling to remote villages on higher slopes. Authorities also airdropped dozens of commando forces at sites where helicopters could not land
.
Afghanistan is prone to deadly earthquakes, particularly in the Hindu Kush mountain range, where the Indian and Eurasian tectonic plates meet.
With homes made mostly of dry masonry, stone and timber, some families preferred to sit out in the open rather than return home as aftershocks continue at regular intervals.
The houses gave little protection from the quakes, in ground left unstable by days of heavy rain, said the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
Resources for rescue and relief work are tight in the South Asian nation of 42 million people pulverised by war, poverty and shrinking aid, where harsh weather presents a further challenge.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s funding cuts to foreign aid and donor frustration over the Taliban’s restrictive policies towards women and its curbs on aid workers have worsened Afghanistan’s isolation.
The World Health Organisation pointed to a funding gap of $3 million, saying it was critical to keep medicines, trauma kits, and essential commodities flowing amid rising demand.
The U.N. World Food Programme has funding and stocks to support the survivors for just four more weeks, its country head, John Aylieff, told Reuters on Wednesday.
Jacopo Caridi of the Norwegian Refugee Council, called for donors to go beyond life-saving relief to ensure Afghans a chance at a future beyond perpetual emergency.
“The earthquake should serve as a stark reminder: Afghanistan cannot be left to face one crisis after another alone,” he said.
Reporting by Sayed Hassib in Mazar Dara, Mohammad Yunus Yawar in Kabul, Charlotte Greenfield and Saeed Shah in Islamabad; Writing by Sudipto Ganguly; Editing by Clarence Fernandez and Ros Russell
Afghanistan earthquake death toll tops 2,200, survivors face aid crunch
Tremors are still being felt in the quake-affected areas, and rescue operations continue with efforts from both the Islamic Emirate and local residents.
The death toll from Sunday night’s deadly earthquake has risen to nearly 1,457, with more than 3,900 injured.
One of the residents of Andarlach village in Dewagul Valley of Chawkay district, Kunar, a 25-year-old man named Wazir, lost 11 family members in the earthquake and has five others injured.
Wazir, a family member of the victims, said: “Eleven are martyred and five are injured. This is my daughter, this is my sister. Two are buried in one grave. This is my brother, this is my mother. My father had two wives, this is my father. Some are buried here, others there, as there was no more space.”
Another family member, Abdul Razzaq, said: “Six of my family members were martyred: four of my sisters, one brother, and my grandmother.”
Abdul Rauf, also from a victim’s family, said: “Four people from my family were martyred, my mother, my sister, and two of my brothers. When the quake struck, I was in Jalalabad. I called my uncle, who told me the houses had collapsed. When I arrived, everything was covered in dust and rubble, nothing was recognizable.”
In Dewagul Valley of Chawkay district, local residents are busy digging mass graves for the victims of the earthquake. Family members describe the devastating scene of losing their loved ones.
Arif, a resident of Chawkay district, said: “Around 90 people in Andarlach valley were martyred because of the earthquake. They were buried, and the tremors have not yet stopped.”
Mohkam Khan added: “One of my family members was martyred and three others are injured, currently in Jalalabad. Both the government and local people cooperated with us. Warning shots were fired to alert others, Mujahideen came and helped us a lot.”
Meanwhile, the deputy spokesman of the Islamic Emirate confirmed the rising number of casualties from Sunday night’s earthquake.
Hamdullah Fitrat, deputy spokesman of the Islamic Emirate, stated: “In the quake-hit districts of Kunar, the number of martyrs has reached 1,457, with 3,394 injured. A total of 6,782 houses have also been destroyed. Operations for the burial of martyrs and evacuation of the injured are ongoing.”
This comes as tremors are still being felt in the quake-affected areas, and rescue operations continue with efforts from both the Islamic Emirate and local residents.
Dozens of homes have been destroyed, leaving many families to spend cold and terrifying nights under the open sky.
Rescue and relief operations are still ongoing in Kunar following Monday night’s deadly earthquake.
After the devastating quake, a number of victims remain trapped under the rubble.
“In Mazar Valley of Kunar, efforts continue to rescue survivors, but in remote areas such as Arit and Shumash, some people are still under the debris, and reaching them is extremely difficult,” reports indicate.
The earthquake destroyed roads in these villages entirely, forcing rescue teams to walk for hours on foot or rely on air transport to reach the affected areas. In some places, helicopters cannot even land.
Mohammad Ghani, a member of a rescue team, said: “We have evacuated 500 injured people from here. Those above have been airlifted by aircraft. The martyrs outside were buried, but those inside the houses remain trapped.”
Abdul Azim, a victim, said: “There is no safe place left in our village. Women and children have been displaced. All houses are destroyed, and if one hasn’t fallen yet, the constant aftershocks, every half hour or 15 minutes, might bring it down as well.”
Meanwhile, residents of these areas say they have not yet received assistance. Lack of drinking water and food remains among their most urgent problems.
Shah Mardan, another victim, said: “The government should realize our situation. Our houses, belongings, and everything are gone. Only this one set of clothes is left on us. Nothing else remains.”
Mohammad Gul, also a victim, added: “The water that used to come through our pipes has been cut off. It’s been 24 hours without drinking water. Food supplies are buried under the rubble.”
Dozens of homes have been destroyed, leaving many families to spend cold and terrifying nights under the open sky.
Not only Nurgal Valley, but also Chawkay district of Kunar has been severely affected, and residents are facing immense challenges.
Rescue Efforts for Earthquake Victims Underway in Kunar
The Taliban have called for international aid as Afghanistan reels from an earthquake that killed more than 1,400 people and left thousands more injured.
Rescuers searched into the night for survivors after the 6.0-magnitude quake struck on Sunday destroying entire villages across the country’s eastern Kunar province, which borders Pakistan.
Many remained trapped under the debris of mud and stone homes built into steep valleys, but rescuers struggled to reach remote areas because of rough mountainous terrain and inclement weather. It was a shallow earthquake, taking place just six miles beneath the Earth’s surface, which is known to have a particularly destructive impact.
On Tuesday, a second earthquake, of magnitude 5.5, also at a shallow depth of six miles, shook south-eastern Afghanistan, prompting fears of further damage and destruction.
‘The walls collapsed around me’: Afghans describe quake devastation
Before the second quake the death toll had passed 1,411 with more than 3,000 people injured, Zabihullah Mujahid, a Taliban government spokesperson, said on Tuesday.
Authorities said they expected casualties to rise further once rescue teams reached more isolated locations, many which were still inaccessible more than 24 hours after the first earthquake struck.
Aseel, a humanitarian tech platform with networks around Afghanistan that has sent teams to the affected areas, said more people had been injured in the second quake, which was expected to push the death toll higher.
Sharafat Zaman, a spokesperson for the health ministry in Kabul, called for international aid to tackle the devastation. “We need it because here lots of people lost their lives and houses,” he said.
Afghanistan had already been suffering from a severe economic crisis and a crippling withdrawal of international aid after the takeover of the country by the Taliban in 2021. Hardline Taliban policies, such as a ban on female education and employment, have resulted in a sharp drop in international aid funding and humanitarian assistance to the country.
The disaster will further stretch the resources of the war-torn nation’s Taliban administration, which is also grappling with the return of hundreds of thousands of Afghans deported by Iran and Pakistan in recent weeks.
The Sunday quake razed three villages in Kunar and caused substantial damage in many others, authorities said. At least 610 people were killed in Kunar and there were 12 dead in Nangarhar, they added.
Ghazi Abad village, in the Nurgal district of Kunar, was a scene of devastation, the entire village destroyed. Homes had been reduced to rubble and many residents remained trapped under the debris.
Some villagers sat weeping amid the piled ruins of their homes. Others began laboriously clearing the debris by hand, or carried out the injured on makeshift stretchers.
“There is not a single standing room visible in this village,” said one resident, Abdullah. “The aftermath of the disaster suggests that life here was ended in mere seconds.”
Abdullah said adjoining villages had also suffered similar fates, completely levelled as the earthquake reduced every home to ruins. “The full extent of the earthquake’s impact will become clearer in the coming days as recovery efforts continue and many are still trapped,” he said.
“The losses are huge, people have no food and safe drinking water. While rescue operations are lacking, people are banding together to search for survivors and recover bodies all day and night. In one household there is no one left, everyone died here and their cattle are left alone.”
Another survivor said: “We need ambulances, we need doctors, we need everything to rescue the injured and recover the dead.”
In Kunar, the dead, some of them children, were wrapped in white shrouds by villagers who prayed over their bodies before burying them, while helicopters ferried the wounded to hospitals.
Rescuers were battling to reach remote mountainous areas cut off from mobile networks along the Pakistani border but their efforts were impeded by heavy rain, which heightened the risk of landslides and left many roads impassable. Military rescue teams fanned out across the region, the defence ministry said, with 40 flights carrying away 420 wounded and dead.
Experts urged the international community to step in and provide support, emphasising that the country’s rescue and relief organisations were barely functional.
“The funds of the Afghan government that have been frozen by the US and other countries should be disbursed to international organisations that are carrying out relief work in Afghanistan,” said Osama Malik, an expert in international law. “The Pakistani government should also halt Afghan deportations at such a critical time when Afghanistan will be unable to manage an influx.”
On Monday, Britain set out emergency funding support for those affected by the recent earthquakes, saying it would ensure that the aid did not go to the Taliban administration by channelling it through its partners.
The US state department posted its condolences on X on Monday for the loss of life but did not immediately respond when asked if the US would provide any assistance.
Afghanistan death toll passes 1,400 as second earthquake strikes
The United Nations says aid workers are still in a “race against time” to remove rubble and rebuild after the devastating earthquake struck eastern Afghanistan last month, killing at least 2,200 people and cutting off remote areas.
The 6.0-magnitude quake on Aug. 31 was shallow, destroying or causing extensive damage to low-rise buildings in the mountainous region. It hit late at night, and homes — mostly made of mud, wood, or rocks — collapsed instantly, becoming death traps.
Satellite data shows that about 40,500 truckloads of debris still needs to be cleared from affected areas in several provinces, the United Nations Development Program said Wednesday. Entire communities have been upended and families are sleeping in the open, it added.
The quake’s epicenter was in remote and rugged Kunar province, challenging rescue and relief efforts by the Taliban government and humanitarian groups. Authorities deployed helicopters or airdropped army commandos to evacuate survivors. Aid workers walked for hours on foot to reach isolated communities.
“This is a race against time,” said Devanand Ramiah, from the UNDP’s Crisis Bureau. “Debris removal and reconstruction operations must start safely and swiftly.”
People’s main demands were the reconstruction of houses and water supplies, according to a spokesman for a Taliban government committee tasked with helping survivors, Zia ur Rahman Speenghar.
People were getting assistance in cash, food, tents, beds, and other necessities, Speenghar said Thursday. Three new roads were under construction in the Dewagal Valley, and roads would be built to areas where there previously were none.
“Various countries and organizations have offered assistance in the construction of houses but that takes time. After the second round of assistance, work will begin on the third round, which is considering what kind of houses can be built here,” the spokesman said.
Afghanistan is facing a “perfect storm” of crises, including natural disasters like the recent earthquake, said Roza Otunbayeva, who leads the U.N. mission to the country.
Afghanistan Peace Campaign
