People check damages after the earthquake in Wuji Township of Yongshan County, southwest China's Yunnan Province, Aug. 17, 2014. [Photo/Xinhua] |
More than 1,000 local officials, policemen and militia personnel have joined rescue efforts and disaster investigations in the affected regions.
About 200 firefighters from various cities have arrived in Yongshan for rescue.
Relief materails including tents, quilts, coats, rice, edible oil, instant noodles and biscuits have beeen supplied to the victims.
Some 647 people have been safely evacuated while 721 households have regained access to electricity, said the statement.
Yunnan governor Li Jiheng led a work team to Yongshan from Ludian, also a county in Zhaotong City, where a 6.5-magnitude earthquake on Aug. 3 killed more than 600 people and destroyed 80,000 homes.
The Yongshan earthquake is not an aftershock of the Ludian earthquake as the epicenters of the two quakes are 113 km away from each other, said Zhang Junwei, an official with the provincial seismological bureau.