Severe Earthquake in China - 2003-02-24

Today, a severe earthquake struck the Xinjiang region in northwestern China, killing at least 257 people and injuring over a thousand. The earthquake had a magnitude of 6.8 on the Richter scale and occurred in an area near the mountains of China, close to the Kyrgyzstan border, approximately 2,800 kilometers from Beijing. The inhabitants of the earthquake-affected area are mainly from the Muslim Uyghur ethnic minority. More than a thousand houses, schools, and other buildings in a village in Bachu County, the epicenter of the earthquake, collapsed. Rescue teams are searching through the rubble for survivors and the deceased. If the earthquake-affected area had not been sparsely populated, the casualties from this devastating earthquake would have been much higher. The Chinese Red Cross has sent rescue teams to assist those who have become homeless, and the central government of China has also dispatched tents, blankets, and other necessities to the earthquake-affected areas. According to Xinhua News Agency, this is considered the most severe earthquake in the seismically active Xinjiang region in the last fifty years. Colin Powell, the U.S. Secretary of State, who was visiting Beijing at the time of the earthquake, expressed condolences to the survivors of the earthquake victims in China.