By KUNA,
Tokyo : The death toll of the May’s 8.0-magnitude earthquake in southwest China’s Sichuan Province is expected to exceed 80,000, Chinese Vice Premier Hui Liangyu said on Tuesday.
As of Monday noon, the death toll of the May 12 earthquake stood at 69,181, with 374,171 people injured and 18,498 people reported missing, state-run Xinhua News Agency quoted Hui as saying in Beijing.
More than 13,000 aftershocks were reported after the devastating quake, with the strongest measuring 6.4 on the Richter scale, by Monday, according to the news agency.
In terms of the intensity and scope of destruction, the quake surpassed the 7.8-magnitude quake in 1976 in Tangshan, northern Hebei Province. That disaster claimed more than 240,000 lives.