Taliban says quake shakes Afghanistan, injures 31 people

An earthquake has shaken a remote area of eastern Afghanistan, injuring at least 31 people, a Taliban official said Tuesday.

The quake struck in the same region where an earthquake last month killed hundreds of people and caused widespread devastation. Earlier reports said 10 people were injured.

The U.S. Geological Survey said Monday’s earthquake had a magnitude of 5.1.

Abdul Wahid Rayan, director of the Taliban news agency Bakhtar, said the quake struck two districts of the eastern Paktika province.

He said that 18 people were injured in Gayan and 13 others injured in Ziruk district, “There are women and children among those injured in the quake,” added Rayan.

Dozens of residential houses were destroyed and there have been several aftershocks since Monday evening, he added.

Last month’s more powerful earthquake ignited yet another crisis in the struggling country, further underscoring the Taliban’s limited capabilities and isolation. U.N. officials said at the time that 770 people were killed, while the Taliban put the death toll at 1,150.

Overstretched aid groups already keeping millions of Afghans alive had rushed supplies to victims of the June quake, but most countries responded tepidly to Taliban calls for international help.

The international cut-off of Afghanistan’s financing has deepened the country’s economic collapse and fueled its humanitarian crises.