The Chinese authorities said on Tuesday that the death toll from a powerful earthquake in the country's southwest was already close to 12,000. Thousands more were injured in the quake which struck at 0628 UTC (early afternoon local time) on Monday, and registered 7.8 on the Richter scale. It's likely that the final figures for deaths and injuries will be much higher, as information about casualties is still coming in. Premier Wen Jiabao said early today that the situation is worse than initially feared.

A strong aftershock on Tuesday sent panicked office workers running into the streets, state media said. The tremor, measuring 6.1 on the Richter scale, shook Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan province, at around 0710 UTC, the Xinhua news agency said.

Earthquake in Sichuan provinceDamage to buildings from Monday's quake is said to be extensive. Several major motorways are impassable and communications are down in large areas. According to early reports, some 80 percent of the buildings were destroyed in the mountainous Sichuan province alone.

Authorities and rescue teams are still struggling to make contact with the worst-hit areas of the province, where phone lines have been cut off since the quake struck. The darkness of night is hampering rescue efforts.

School building collapses
The official Xinhua news agency reported a particular incident in which about 900 teenagers were buried in the rubble of a collapsed three-story school building in the city of Dujiangyan. It said local villagers had already helped dozens of students out of the ruins and five cranes were excavating at the site as anxious parents looked on.

Dozens of deaths were reported from the provincial capital, Chengdu, a sprawling city of 10 million which Premier Wen Jiabao visited just after the quake. Meanwhile, President Hu Jintao ordered an "all-out" rescue effort.

Thousands of army troops and paramilitary People's Armed Police carrying medical supplies have been sent to the region. But a landslide had blocked a mountain road leading to Wenchuan, preventing troops from reaching the scene, state radio said.

Key sites unaffected
The quake could be felt as far away as Thailand and Vietnam, but Xinhua insists that there is no immediate impact to the Three Gorges Dam project, the weight of whose massive reservoir, hundreds of kilometres from Chengdu, experts have said could increase the risk of tremors. A source at the biggest refinery in western China, Lanzhou, said the plant also appeared unaffected by the quake.

In Beijing and Shanghai, office workers poured into the streets as the tremor hit. In the capital, which will host the summer Olympics in August, there was no visible damage and the showpiece Bird's Nest stadium was unscathed.

(Sources: Reuters, AFP)