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China's disaster
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A spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Washington said Friday that a devastating earthquake in southwest China destroyed 436,000 properties leading to 4.8 million homeless, according to official figures. Rescue workers recover bodies from a collapsed building in Dujiangyan Friday as relatives watch. At a news conference in the U.S. capital, Wang Baodong said the disaster had led to 500 deaths outside Sichuan province, the hardest hit area. The official death toll now stands at 22,000, with 14,000 still buried. The suffering of Sichuan's inhabitants has been prolonged by repeated aftershocks, some 4,400 since the quake hit, according to Baodong. The latest aftershock hit quake-damaged areas Friday, triggering landslides, blocking roads, knocking out phone lines and burying vehicles, state-run media reported.
Baodong said that rescuers now have reached all 58 counties and towns in southwest China that were stricken by Monday's earthquake.Quoting from a statement by the president, he said, "Saving lives is still the top priority," and the nation has to make more efforts to treat the injured. Hu described the current situation as "the most crucial phase" of the rescue effort. "We must race against time to overcome all difficulties." The original magnitude 7.9 earthquake hit Sichuan Province the hardest, shattering communities, leveling dozens of schools and burying transportation routes with landslides.As frantic search-and-rescue efforts entered a fifth day, the official death toll issued by authorities in Sichuan Province now stood at 22,069, with 14,000 still buried, 159,000 injured and 4.8 million homeless, according to China's Xinhua state news agency. China's state council said Thursday that the number of dead could eventually top 50,000. Yet hope still emerged from amid the horror of the nation's worst disaster in recent years, with survivors pulled from the rubble four days after being buried in the rubble.


May 16, 2008 | 11:38 AM Comments  0 comments

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