At least 20 people were killed as a result of the severe earthquake that struck northern Afghanistan overnight, according to what the Ministry of Health announced in a new, non-final toll on Monday morning.
Ministry spokesman Sharafat Zaman said in a video clip distributed to journalists that “about 320 of our citizens were wounded and more than 20 killed” in the provinces of Balkh and Samangan, stressing that this toll is not final.
A previous official toll was that nine people were killed and more than 250 injured as a result of the earthquake, which had a magnitude of 6.3, according to the US Geological Survey.
A 6.3-magnitude earthquake struck northern Afghanistan on Sunday night, according to the US Geological Survey, and social media accounts posted video clips of the moment the earthquake struck.
The earthquake, which reached a depth of 28 kilometers, occurred at 20:28 GMT in Khulm, near the city of Mazar-i-Sharif in Balkh province, according to the American authority. The Geological Survey had previously reported that the depth of the earthquake reached 10 kilometers.
Local authorities set emergency numbers for residents, but did not report any casualties.
In Mazar-i-Sharif, many residents rushed out of their homes for fear of possible aftershocks, according to an Agence France-Presse correspondent. Residents of distant areas, including the capital, Kabul, felt the tremors.
At the end of August, a six-magnitude earthquake struck the east of the country, claiming the lives of more than 2,200 people. Afghanistan, located at the intersection of the Eurasian and Indian tectonic plates, is frequently exposed to earthquakes.
Since 1900, the northeast of the country has witnessed 12 earthquakes with a magnitude exceeding seven, according to Brian Baptee, a seismologist at the British Geological Survey.
In October 2023, an earthquake measuring 6.3 degrees, followed by a series of strong aftershocks, struck Herat Province in western Afghanistan, killing more than 1,500 people and destroying or damaging more than 63,000 homes, according to United Nations estimates.
