Aftershock rocks Peru
The original quake left thousands homeless
A powerful aftershock measuring 5.7 on the Richter scale has hit Peru, as rescue workers continued their search for survivors from Saturday's deadly earthquake.
The aftershock hit Peru at 2318 on Monday (0418 GMT on Tuesday), and seismologists warned that others might follow.
The death toll from Saturday's earthquake reached 97, the authorities said, after reports started trickling in from isolated villages.
Thirty-nine of the victims died in a tidal wave triggered by the massive quake, the national civil defence agency said on Tuesday. More than 50 people are reported missing and officials expect the death toll to climb higher.
Information from rescue workers who have managed to reach remote areas cut off by the quake indicate that an estimated 40,000 people were affected, and many of them were made homeless.
Aid is beginning to arrive but the Red Cross and other international organisations have called for urgent donations of food and blankets.
Bitter temperatures
"We are sleeping on the street and no one is helping us. (Relief officials) just come and go," Giovana Arriola told Reuters news agency. She was camping out in the rubble-strewn streets with her family for a second winter night.
Peru's rescue efforts are being hampered by scant resources.
The quake, now estimated to have measured 8.1 on the Richter scale, was the strongest in Peru for 30 years. It caused widespread damage and disruption.
Most of the casualties and damage are concentrated in and around Peru's second city, Arequipa, where part of the ancient cathedral and other old buildings were destroyed.
A huge rescue operation is also under way in parts of Bolivia and Chile, where teams of emergency workers have continued scouring the mountains to find survivors.
Littering southern Peru with rubble and debris, the earthquake triggered mudslides which blocked roads, destroyed houses and cut off electricity supplies and phone lines.
A BBC correspondent in Peru, Claire Marshall, says the devastating tremors flattened entire local towns, where the houses were mostly made out of mud brick and unable to withstand the force of the earthquake.
Shaking
Speaking hours after the powerful earthquake, the people of the city recalled the moment with fear.
"It just started shaking and it was unending," a woman who has lived in the city for the last 25 years said.
The acting President of Peru, Valentine Paniagua, travelled to the disaster zone, where he said the situation was "heart-wrenching".
The President-elect, Alejandro Toledo, arrived in Arequipa after postponing a trip to the United States "to extend a hand of solidarity".
Our correspondent says a weary crowd managed to raise a cheer for him on his visit to assess the damage in the area.
"This is not a very happy moment but we're going to rebuild this," Mr Toledo said, adding that he intended to ask for international financial help.
Peru was battered by a strong 7.7 magnitude
tremor in 1970 that killed approximately 70,000
people and left about 600,000 homeless across
the country.
-- Anonymous, June 26, 2001