According to MRTV, 68 people remained missing across the country.

International aid and rescue efforts continue to ramp up as Myanmar and Thailand recover from Friday’s devastating quakes.

Teams aboard a China Eastern Airlines plane reached Myanmar to deliver crucial aid, according to a statement. “At 8:35 am Saturday, China Eastern Airlines flight MU9003 arrived at Yangon International Airport, carrying 37 Chinese rescuers and 5 tons of medical supplies, tents, blankets and other relief materials,” it said.

India also delivered 15 tons of relief material, including tents, sleeping bags, blankets, ready-to-eat meals, water purifiers, hygiene kits, medicines, and medical equipment.

Russia's Emergency Situations Ministry dispatched two aircraft including 120 specialists, anesthesiologists, and psychologists, K9 search units, and rescue personnel to assist in recovery efforts, the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

The UN also allocated an emergency $5 million fund to Myanmar for earthquake aid while determining additional needs and coordinating the response, according to a UN spokesman.

In addition, authorities in neighboring Thailand said 11 provinces were affected, with eight dead and 101 missing after a skyscraper in Bangkok collapsed.

At least 50 mosques across Myanmar collapsed during Friday prayers, killing nearly 300, according to Khit Thit News.

Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Australia, Pakistan, New Zealand, and other nations expressed solidarity and offered aid to Myanmar, which is also engulfed in internal ethnic conflicts.

Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, Myanmar’s junta ruler, visited affected areas in the Mandalay region and inspected measures taken to rescue people, state-run MRTV said via Telegram.

The junta, in a rare move, appealed to the international community for humanitarian aid.

A strong 7.7 magnitude earthquake struck Friday with its epicenter in Myanmar's Sagaing region.

The first jolt was followed by a 6.4-magnitude earthquake 12 minutes later, according to the US Geological Survey.

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The death toll from a huge earthquake that hit Myanmar and Thailand has passed 700, as rescuers dug through the rubble of collapsed buildings in a desperate search for survivors, AzVision.az reports, citing Al Jazeera. 

At least 694 people were killed and nearly 1,700 injured in Myanmar’s Mandalay region – the country’s second-largest city and close to the epicentre of the quake – the country’s military government said in a statement on Saturday.

In the Thai capital Bangkok – located 1,000km (620 miles) from the epicentre in Myanmar – about 10 more deaths have been confirmed.

“Infrastructure such as roads, bridges, and buildings were affected, leading to casualties and injuries among civilians. Search and rescue operations are currently being carried out in the affected areas,” Myanmar’s military said in the statement, which raised the death toll sharply from a previously reported 144 deaths.

The shallow 7.7-magnitude quake struck northwest of the city of Sagaing in central Myanmar in the early afternoon on Friday, followed minutes later by a 6.7-magnitude aftershock.

The quake destroyed buildings, downed bridges, and buckled roads across swaths of Myanmar, and due to patchy communications in remote areas, many believe the true scale of the disaster has yet to emerge.

Rescuers in Bangkok laboured through the night on Friday searching for workers trapped when a 30-storey skyscraper under construction collapsed, reduced in seconds to a pile of rubble and twisted metal by the force of the shaking.

Bangkok Governor Chadchart Sittipunt said that about 10 people had been confirmed killed across the city, most in the skyscraper collapse. But up to 100 workers were still unaccounted for at the building site, close to the Chatuchak weekend market that is a magnet for tourists.

AzVision.az

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