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Quake aid shaky, toll up to 530
Rescuers pulled out more bodies on Wednesday from the rubble of mountain villages flattened by a powerful earthquake in southeast Iran that claimed some 530 lives and left thousands without shelter.
Rescuers pulled out more bodies on Wednesday from the rubble of mountain villages flattened by a powerful earthquake in southeast Iran that claimed some 530 lives and left thousands without shelter.
Interior minister Abdolvahed Moussavi Lari told journalists at the scene that the final death toll from the disaster in Kerman province “could reach 550 but not much more than that” and said Iran did not need foreign aid.
Hundreds of rescue workers and soldiers were searching through the rubble with their bare hands as blocked roads made it impossible for heavy earthmoving equipment to reach some villages.
Angry residents of Islamabad village in one of the most devastated areas blocked roads in protest at the delay in receiving basic aid such as tents and blankets, after spending the night in freezing cold and rain.
About 30,000 people in 40 villages have been affected by the latest temblor, the deadliest in Iran since the Bam earthquake of December 2003 that killed more than 30,000.
A group of about 100 villagers used a truck to block a road and try to intercept humanitarian aid as women threw stones at passing cars, reports said.
And about 20 men lay down across the road to block the path of Lari’s convoy and had to be removed by force, police said.
Rescuers on Wednesday pulled 27 bodies from the ruins of Houtkan village in the stricken Zarand region near the epicentre of the 6.4 magnitude quake, and many more were still feared trapped under the rubble.
The grim discovery in Houtkan added to a death toll from Tuesday’s quake.
