Earthquake in Afghanistan Kills at Least 13, Nine of Them in Pakistan

People come out of a restaurant after a tremor was felt in Lahore, Pakistan March 21, 2023. (Reuters)
People come out of a restaurant after a tremor was felt in Lahore, Pakistan March 21, 2023. (Reuters)
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Earthquake in Afghanistan Kills at Least 13, Nine of Them in Pakistan

People come out of a restaurant after a tremor was felt in Lahore, Pakistan March 21, 2023. (Reuters)
People come out of a restaurant after a tremor was felt in Lahore, Pakistan March 21, 2023. (Reuters)

At least 13 people were killed and more than 90 injured in Pakistan and Afghanistan after a magnitude 6.5 earthquake struck late on Tuesday, government officials said.

At least nine people were killed and 44 injured in northwest Pakistan, a Pakistani government official said, and hospitals in northern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province were put into a state of emergency overnight.

At least four people were killed and 50 injured in Afghanistan, a health ministry official there said.

Houses and buildings in both countries were also damaged, authorities said.

The quake was felt over an area more than 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) wide by some 285 million people in Pakistan, India, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan, the European-Mediterranean Seismological Center said.

The epicenter was in the Hindu Kush mountains, in the sparsely populated northeastern Afghan province of Badakhshan, 40km southeast of Jurm village, at the considerable depth of 187km, the US Geological Survey said.

In Pakistan's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province senior provincial official Abdul Basit said that addition to the dead and injured, at least 19 houses were damaged.

Shafiullah Rahimi, a spokesperson for Afghanistan's disaster mitigation ministry, said late on Tuesday that two people had been killed in the eastern province of Laghman.

Large parts of South Asia are seismically active because a tectonic plate known as the Indian plate is pushing north into the Eurasian plate.

A 6.1 magnitude earthquake in eastern Afghanistan killed more than 1,000 people last year.

In 2005, at least 73,000 people were killed by a 7.6 magnitude quake that struck northern Pakistan.



Pro-Palestinian Activists Charged with Damaging Planes at UK Air Base are Held in Custody

An activist from Palestine Action sprays a military aircraft engine with red paint at RAF Brize Norton, to damage it, in Carterton, Britain, June 20, 2025, in this still image obtained from handout video. The group's action was in protest of British military assistance to Israel, claiming that they, "interrupted Britain's direct participation in the commission of genocide and war crimes across the Middle East", stating on their website. Palestine Action/Handout via REUTERS/File photo
An activist from Palestine Action sprays a military aircraft engine with red paint at RAF Brize Norton, to damage it, in Carterton, Britain, June 20, 2025, in this still image obtained from handout video. The group's action was in protest of British military assistance to Israel, claiming that they, "interrupted Britain's direct participation in the commission of genocide and war crimes across the Middle East", stating on their website. Palestine Action/Handout via REUTERS/File photo
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Pro-Palestinian Activists Charged with Damaging Planes at UK Air Base are Held in Custody

An activist from Palestine Action sprays a military aircraft engine with red paint at RAF Brize Norton, to damage it, in Carterton, Britain, June 20, 2025, in this still image obtained from handout video. The group's action was in protest of British military assistance to Israel, claiming that they, "interrupted Britain's direct participation in the commission of genocide and war crimes across the Middle East", stating on their website. Palestine Action/Handout via REUTERS/File photo
An activist from Palestine Action sprays a military aircraft engine with red paint at RAF Brize Norton, to damage it, in Carterton, Britain, June 20, 2025, in this still image obtained from handout video. The group's action was in protest of British military assistance to Israel, claiming that they, "interrupted Britain's direct participation in the commission of genocide and war crimes across the Middle East", stating on their website. Palestine Action/Handout via REUTERS/File photo

Four pro-Palestinian protesters were held in custody Thursday after their first appearance in a London court on charges they damaged two Royal Air Force planes with red paint and crowbars.

The charges come after the group Palestine Action said two of its members entered RAF Brize Norton on June 20 and used electric scooters to approach two Voyager jets used for air-to-air refueling. The protesters used repurposed fire extinguishers to spray paint into the planes’ jet engines and caused further damage with crowbars, according to the group, which released video footage of the incident, The AP news reported.

The four, all between the ages of 22 and 35, are charged with conspiracy to commit criminal damage and conspiracy to enter a prohibited place for purposes prejudicial to the interests of the UK, counterterror police said in a statement. The Crown Prosecution Service will argue that the offenses have a “terrorist connection,” police said.

The group did not enter pleas in Westminster Magistrates’ Court. They were scheduled to appear July 18 at the Central Criminal Court.

Palestine Action has claimed responsibility for a series of incidents targeting Israeli defense contractors in the UK and other sites linked to the war in Gaza.

Following the incident at RAF Brize Norton, the government introduced legislation to ban Palestine Action as a terrorist organization. The measure, being debated in Parliament, would make it a criminal offense to belong to or support the group, with a maximum of 14 years in prison.

Palestine Action said its protests are designed to end international support for Israel’s war in Gaza.

Planes from Brize Norton, 70 miles (112 kilometers) northwest of London, regularly fly to RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, Britain’s main air base for operations in the Middle East.