A second earthquake has hit a region of Afghanistan still reeling from a tremor that killed more than 1,400 people and injured some 3,000 others.
Sunday's magnitude-6.0 quake, the worst in years, has killed at least 1,411 people and injured another 3,124, with some 5,400 houses destroyed, Taliban administration spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said.
The death toll was announced before a magnitude-5.2 earthquake hit the same region affected by Sunday's tremor.
Tuesday's quake hit just before 6pm, local time, and its epicentre was 34km north-east of Jalalabad, the The United States Geological Survey (USGS) said.
[MAP]The aftershock caused panic and halted rescue efforts as it sent rocks sliding down mountains, cutting off roads further and making it dangerous to dig through rubble, said Safiullah Noorzai, who works with Aseel, a humanitarian tech platform with networks around Afghanistan.
His organisation had been working in the mountainous region and believed the aftershock would have killed more people.
The Afghan Red Crescent Society, a humanitarian group working in the region, said many people are still trapped under the rubble from the first earthquake.
The United Nations has warned the number killed is likely to rise and that the number of people impacted could reach the hundreds of thousands.
"We cannot afford to forget the people of Afghanistan who are facing multiple crises, multiple shocks, and the resilience of the communities has been saturated," Indrika Ratwatte, the UN's resident coordinator for Afghanistan, told a media briefing on Tuesday.
He urged the international community to step forward.
"These are life and death decisions while we race against time to reach people."
Rescue efforts are focused on the eastern provinces of Kunar and Nangarhar, where the earthquake hit the hardest.
Gul Bibi, an 80-year-old, was weeping, holding a toddler in her arms, next to a destroyed house in the mountain village of Mazar Dara, one of the places worst hit in Kunar province.
"I lost everything," Bibi said, saying her family was buried under the mud and debris of their home.
"Just this grandson survived."
In Dara-e-Noor, in the province of Nangarhar, 23-year-old Ziarat Gul said his uncle’s house collapsed, killing a seven-year-old boy and two girls.
"We pulled them out with our hands, but they were already gone."
He and his family have been sleeping in open fields since the quake.
Ehsanullah Ehsan, the provincial head of disaster management, said efforts would now move to helping those in more remote villages.
"We cannot accurately predict how many bodies might still be trapped under the rubble," Mr Ehsan said.
"Our effort is to complete these operations as soon as possible and to begin distributing aid to the affected families."
Mountainous terrain and inclement weather have hindered rescuers reaching remote areas along the Pakistani border where the quake flattened hundreds of mud-and-brick homes.
Access for vehicles along narrow mountain roads was the main obstacle, he said, adding machinery was being brought in to clear roads of debris.
On Tuesday, a line of ambulances was on the damaged mountain road trying to reach Kunar villages, as helicopters flew in, bringing aid supplies and taking the injured to hospitals, according to a Reuters witness.
Some of those injured have been transferred to hospitals in Kabul and the adjacent province of Nangarhar.
Aid slow to arrive
The UN warned on Tuesday that thousands of children were particularly vulnerable following the disaster, with UNICEF sending medicine, clothing, tents, hygiene and sanitary items as well as towels and water buckets.
Local authorities said many people were living in the open after having their houses destroyed.
The rescue and relief work has struggled in the face of tight resources in the war-torn, impoverished nation of 42 million people and limited global help in the aftermath of the tragedy.
Britain has allocated £1 million ($2.56m) to support aid efforts provided by the UN and International Red Cross.
Other nations such as China, the United Arab Emirates, the European Union, Pakistan and Iran have pledged help but aid is yet to arrive.
India delivered 1,000 tents and was sending 15 tonnes of food to Kunar, with further relief expected to be sent on Tuesday.
Afghanistan has been badly hit by US President Donald Trump's decision to cut funding to its humanitarian arm USAID and reductions in other foreign aid programmes.
Crises elsewhere in the world, along with donor frustration over the Taliban's policies toward women and curbs on aid workers, have been a factor in funding cuts, according to diplomats and aid officials.
ABC/wires
