Earthquake in Sichuan

From BBC news

Troops have arrived in Wenchuan county at the epicentre, which was largely cut off by the quake - but heavy rain is hampering rescue operations.

Elsewhere in Sichuan province, frantic efforts are being made to reach thousands of people under the rubble.

The death toll is now more than 12,000, officials say, and looks set to rise.

The quake - now upgraded to 7.9 magnitude - struck on Monday at 1428 local time (0628 GMT) and was felt as far away as Beijing and the Thai capital, Bangkok.


In one city, Mianyang, near the epicentre, more than 18,000 people are said to be buried under the rubble and 3,629 have been confirmed dead, state news agency Xinhua reports.

Beijing has deployed 50,000 troops to help with relief efforts, but they have not yet all arrived.

About 1,300 rescue troops and medics have reached Wenchuan county and immediately started searching for survivors and treating the injured, Xinhua reported.

More than 150 people were killed in the provinces of Gansu and Shaanxi, and in Chongqing municipality, Xinhua said.

And there are fears for the safety of staff, tourists - including a group of 15 British visitors - and the panda population at a giant panda research centre at Wolong in Wenchuan, which has not yet been contacted.

But 60 pandas at another breeding centre - in Chengdu - are reportedly safe.

China's Olympic Games organisers say they will scale down the route of the torch through the country and there will be a minute's silence when the next leg starts in the south-eastern city of Ruijin on Wednesday.

US President George W Bush expressed condolences to victims' families, while the US, UK, the European Union, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan reportedly offered aid.

China said it would accept international help to cope with the quake - the worst since 1976 when 242,000 people were killed in Tangshan - and offered its thanks.

The government response was praised as "swift and very efficient" by Francis Marcus of the International Federation of the Red Cross in Beijing.

But he added the scale of the disaster was such that "we can't expect that the government can do everything and handle every aspect of the needs".

The BBC's Quentin Sommerville in Beijing says this is one of the most open and speedy responses to an emergency he has ever seen from Chinese state media.