Seven killed, many injured in Iraq border quake

Social media reports tremors in Kuwait

TEHRAN: Seven people were killed and many were injured in an earthquake that hit the Iraq-Iran border on Sunday, state TV reported.

Iranian state TV said the 7.2-magnitude earthquake jolted the region near the border between Iran and Iraq.

The US Geological Survey confirmed the quake on its website, placing its epicenter at around 32 km outside the Iraqi city of Halabja, and issuing an “orange” alert for “shakingrelated fatalities and economic losses.”

The Iranian ILNA news agency reported that at least 14 provinces had been impacted by the quake.

Iranian social media was abuzz with posts of people evacuating their homes, especially from the cities of Ghasr-e Shirin (near Iraqi border) and Kermanshah.

Faramarz Akbari, Ghasr-e Shirin’s governor, confirmed that six people had died, according to the state-run IRNA news agency.

People on social media reported tremors across Iraq and into Kuwait.

Esmail Najar, head of Iran’s National Disaster Management Organization, said “some injured people might be buried under the rubble in Ghasr-e Shirin.”

In Irbil, at least one person died and 50 were wounded, according to local officials.

Health officials, quoted by Reuters, said most of the wounded were in Darbandikhan, 75 km east of the major city of Sulaimaniyah in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region.

Iran is prone to near daily quakes as it sits on many major fault lines. In 2003, a 6.6 magnitude flattened the historic city of Bam, killing 26,000 people.