Xi orders “to make all possible efforts to carry out the search and rescue” of the population
At least 53 people have died and 62 have been injured after an earthquake of magnitude 6.8 on the Richter scale that took place this Tuesday morning in Dingri county, which is in the autonomous region of Tibet, in southwest China.
The Xinhua news agency has indicated that the injuries are of varying degrees of severity and that thousands of houses have been damaged, since many of those that were near the epicenter have collapsed. The regional authorities have launched a second level response.
After the earthquake, which occurred after 9:00 a.m. (local time, 2:00 a.m. Spanish peninsular time) with a depth of ten kilometers, fifty aftershocks have been recorded, most of them below magnitude 3.0.
Chinese President Xi Jinping has ordered “every effort to search and rescue” the population. He has thus asked to treat the injured, minimize casualties, prevent secondary disasters and relocate those affected.
“We must strengthen monitoring and early warning of earthquakes, allocate emergency rescue materials in a timely manner, repair damaged infrastructure as soon as possible, organize basic housing arrangements for the people and guarantee a safe and warm winter,” he said.
For his part, Chinese Premier Li Qiang has urged to “speed up the verification” of victims and damages, since the area affected by the earthquake is located in a high-altitude and cold region. “It is winter and we must do everything possible to guarantee the basic subsistence and warmth of the population in the disaster area,” he added.
Dingri Governor Tashi Dundup said the safe evacuation of people has been arranged to avoid the impact of aftershocks, while officers have been deployed to carry out search and rescue operations.
