EARTHQUAKE VICTIMS PROTESTS AUTHORITIES INDIFFERENCE
TEHRAN - 23 Jun (IPS) Angry victims of
the Saturday morning earthquake showered Interior Minister’s bullet-proofed
car with stones and other objects in protest to President Mohammad Khatami
government’s slow reaction meeting their most urgent and vital needs,
eyewitnesses reported from the city of Avaj, the epicentre of the tremor
alongside of Boo’inzahara, in the Qazvin Province.
The quake, registering 6.0 on the Richter scale, struck on early Saturday, devastating tens of towns and villages in eight provinces, including Tehran, Qazvin, Hamadan and Gilan.
The State-run, conservatives-controlled Television said the Interior Ministry had sharply revised down the initial toll from Saturday's quake to 230, against an earlier estimate of 500 dead.
A Red Crescent official in Qazvin province later said 212 bodies had been dug out of the rubble and buried.
Both the leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenehe'i and President Mohammad Khatami expressed their condolences to the nation and proclaimed a three days national mourning, called on officials to "co-operate with each other in order to be able to provide swift help to the victims" Tehran Radio, which is also controlled by the conservatives reported.
"As they reached Avaj, cars transporting Hojjatoleslam Abdolvahed Moosavi-Lari, the Interior Minister and other officials were hit by a rain of stones from angry people protesting the authorities slow action, if not their indifference, in sending much needed relief and emergency goods and equipments", one eyewitness told Iran Press Service on telephone.
Earlier, more than 300 inhabitants of Avaj had staged a protest march, the same source said, adding that the announcement that the authorities had turned down an offer by the Americans to send emergency assistance had infuriated the grieved people.
Mr. Amir Zaherkhani, an official in Boo’inzahra, cited by the official news agency IRNA, said aid workers were running short on tents for the injured and homeless.
As condolences and offers of help flooded in Sunday, Interior Minister rejected United States’ offer for assistance, saying it would accept them if coming from American NGO’s.
President George W. Bush said Saturday that he was "saddened by the news of the earthquake", and added, "Human suffering knows no political boundaries. We stand ready to assist the people of Iran as needed and as desired", IRNA reported from New York.
Like most rural Iran, the region's housing is characteristically a mud hut, a structure especially vulnerable to strong quakes, although the area is home to several faults that typically generate small tremors daily.
UN Secretary General Kofi Annan was among those who offered condolences to Iran Saturday for the loss of life and widespread damage wrought by the quake and Pope John Paul II, during his Sunday prayers, called on the world to be "generous" in helping needy victims of the tremor.
France, Kuwait, Japan, Turkey, Germany and Azerbaijan have also sent their condolences to Iran and offered aid.
Germany, Iran’s mot important trade partner, immediately offered 500,000 euros in aid. "The international community must help the victims of this earthquake", Cooperation and Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul said Sunday
Australia offered one million Australian Dollars. Turkey and Russia said they were sending planes loaded with food and medicines.
The Iran representative of the UN children's fund UNICEF, Suleiman Diallo, said a UN mission was going to the Qazvin region Sunday, "and will make a report for the different United Nations agencies so that we can provide whatever aid is needed."
Diallo said UNICEF had made arrangements for aid including blankets to be sent quickly by plane to the quake victims.
Casualties mounted through the day Saturday, as officials worked feverishly to provide aid and hospitals filled.
Saturday's quake was followed by 21 aftershocks, three of which exceeded 4.0 degrees in intensity, and experts have warned that tremors could continue for another two weeks.
Iran is one of the most quake-prone regions in the world, with almost daily tremors. A strong earthquake in September 1984 killed tens of thousands of people. Saturday's quake comes nearly 12 years to the day after the 21 June 1990 earthquake, measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale, and devastated Iran's northern Gilan province, killing some 37,000 people, and injured more than 100,000, with three cities destroyed.