Hope dwindles for survivors days after deadly Afghan quake
A village lies in rubble after Sunday night's powerful 6.0-magnitude earthquake that struck several provinces, in a remote valley in Kunar province, Afghanistan, on Sep 2, 2025. (Photo: AP/Nava Jamshidi)
JALALABAD: Hope was quickly fading of finding survivors in the rubble of homes devastated by the weekend's powerful earthquake in eastern Afghanistan, as emergency services struggled to reach remote villages on Wednesday (Sep 3).
A shallow magnitude-6.0 earthquake hit the mountainous region bordering Pakistan late on Sunday, collapsing mud-brick homes on families as they slept.
Fearful of the near-constant aftershocks rattling the area, people huddled in the open air while rescuers struggled to unearth those trapped under the heaps of flattened buildings.
The earthquake killed more than 1,400 people and injured over 3,300, Taliban authorities said, making it one of the deadliest in decades to hit the impoverished country.
The vast majority of the casualties were in Kunar province, with a dozen dead and hundreds hurt in nearby Nangarhar and Laghman provinces.
In Kunar's Nurgal district, victims remained trapped under the rubble and were difficult to rescue, local official Ijaz Ulhaq Yaad told AFP on Wednesday.
"There are some villages which have still not received aid," he said.
Landslides caused by the earthquake stymied access to already isolated villages.
The non-governmental group Save the Children said one of its aid teams "had to walk for 20kmto reach villages cut off by rock falls, carrying medical equipment on their backs with the help of community members".
The World Health Organization warned the number of casualties from the earthquake was expected to rise, "as many remain trapped in destroyed buildings".
More than 12,000 people have been directly affected by the earthquake, according to ActionAid, noting women and girls were particularly vulnerable in emergencies as they face steep restrictions under the Taliban authorities.
An AFP journalist in Mazar Dara village in Kunar said a small mobile clinic was deployed to provide emergency care but people were still in desperate need of emergency food, water and shelter.
One family of 10 shared a meagre meal of just two pieces of bread, he said.
The World Food Programme said its teams were working to provide provisions but "the reality is brutal" in a country where many already go hungry.
DEEPENING CRISIS
This is the third major earthquake since the Taliban took power in 2021, but there are even fewer resources for the cash-strapped government's response after the United States slashed assistance to the country when President Donald Trump took office in January.
Even before the earthquake, the United Nations estimated it had obtained less than a third of the funding required for operations countrywide.
Multiple countries have pledged assistance but NGOs and the UN have voiced alarm that dwindling aid could hamper relief efforts in one of the poorest countries in the world.
In two days, the Taliban government's defence ministry said it organised 155 helicopter flights to evacuate around 2,000 injured and their relatives to regional hospitals.
On Tuesday, a defence ministry commission said it had instructed "the relevant institutions to take measures in all areas to normalise the lives of the earthquake victims", without providing further details on the plans to do so.
Deputy government spokesman Hamdullah Fitrat said a camp had been set up in Khas Kunar district to coordinate emergency aid, while two other sites were opened near the epicentre "to oversee the transfer of the injured, the burial of the dead, and the rescue of survivors".
After decades of conflict, Afghanistan is facing endemic poverty, severe drought and the influx of millions of Afghans forced back to the country by neighbours Pakistan and Iran in the years since the Taliban takeover.
"This earthquake could not have come at a worse time," Jagan Chapagain, secretary general of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, said in a statement late Tuesday.
"The disaster not only brings immediate suffering but also deepens Afghanistan's already fragile humanitarian crisis."
Afghanistan is frequently hit by earthquakes, with the country still recovering from previous disasters.
Western Herat province was devastated in October 2023 by a 6.3-magnitude earthquake, which killed more than 1,500 people and damaged or destroyed more than 63,000 homes.
And a 5.9-magnitude quake struck the eastern province of Paktika in June 2022, killing more than 1,000 people and leaving tens of thousands homeless.
