7.5 magnitude earthquake hits Afghanistan. India and Pakistan, over 260 dead

More than 180 people have died, mostly in Pakistan, after a magnitude-7.5 earthquake hit north-eastern Afghanistan. Tremors from the quake were also felt in northern India and Tajikistan. At least 12 of the victims were Afghan schoolgirls killed in a crush as they tried to get out of their building. The earthquake was centred in the mountainous Hindu Kush region, 76km (45 miles) south of Faizabad, the US Geological Survey reported.
Buildings have been evacuated and communications disrupted in many areas. However as the earthquake originated more than 200km (125 miles) below the earth's surface, the damage is less than that which a similarly powerful but shallow tremor might cause. In Pakistan, the military said 123 people were known to have died in the north of the country. Most of those fatalities were in the Malakand region of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. Pakistan's Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif is cutting short a visit abroad and returning home, the BBC reports.

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Deaths and injuries have also been reported in the Afghan provinces of Nangarhar, Badakhshan and Kunar, with at least 35 killed in total. Afghanistan's Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah tweeted that the government had asked aid agencies to work with it to help those in need.
In the city of Karimabad, in Pakistan's Gilgit-Baltistan, a witness who gave his name as Anas told the BBC that the quake had sent a landslide crashing into the Hunza river.
"At first it was as if someone was shaking us. There were about 20 of us and we just held on to each other," he said.
"Right after that we saw a major landslide. Some people say it was a glacier that came down, some people say it was a hill. It fell right in front of our eyes."
Pakistan Geological Survey head Imran Khan told the BBC there were reports of landslides disrupting the Karakoram highway between Gilgit and Baltistan. However, he said it was too early to say if any glaciers were destabilised by the quake.
The region has a history of powerful earthquakes caused by the northward collision of India with Eurasia. The two plates are moving towards each other at a rate of 4-5cm per year.
In 2005, a magnitude 7.6 quake in Pakistan-administered Kashmir left more than 75,000 people dead.
In April this year, Nepal suffered its worst earthquake on record with 9,000 people killed and about 900,000 homes damaged or destroyed.