The United Nations’ World Food Program on Wednesday appealed for $19 million to provide emergency assistance to tens of thousands of people affected by a series of devastating earthquakes and aftershocks that has rocked western Afghanistan.
Ana Maria Salhuana, deputy country director of the World Food Program in Afghanistan, said it was helping survivors but it urgently needed more funding because “we are having to take this food from an already severely underfunded program.”
The group said it is working to provide emergency food assistance to 100,000 people in the region.
A 6.3 magnitude earthquake struck part of western Afghanistan on Sunday, after thousands of people died and entire villages were flattened by major quakes a week earlier. It was the fourth quake the U.S. Geological Survey has measured at 6.3 magnitude in the same area in just over a week.
The initial earthquakes on Oct. 7 flattened whole villages in Herat province and were among the most destructive quakes in the country’s recent history.
The WFP said staffers responded within hours of the first earthquakes, distributing fortified biscuits, pulses and other food items to affected families in destroyed villages.
“An estimated 25,000 buildings have been destroyed,” the group said a statement. “The survivors are currently sleeping in tents next to the rubble of their homes, desperate and afraid of further earthquakes and aftershocks.”