One week after a devastating 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck Nepal, officials say thousands of people are still missing, including about 1,000 Europeans.
Officials said Saturday the death toll has passed 6,600, with most of those killed in and around the capital, Kathmandu.
Authorities say there is little hope more survivors will be found in the massive rubble.
Survivors are urging the government and aide groups to move faster to get food, water and other assistance to the many people living in the open after losing their homes.
In Kathmandu, some signs of normalcy have returned as merchants conducted business and some residents packed up tents and moved indoors. Still, the overwhelming smell of dead bodies has become a main reason many residents have not returned to their homes.
U.N. humanitarian affairs chief Valerie Amos visited devastated areas in Nepal on Friday as part of her three-day visit to assess relief operations. She told reporters that emergency funding for relief efforts was streaming into the country and urged the international community to increase its support.
Amos made the appeal in Kathmandu alongside Christos Stylianides, European Union commissioner for humanitarian aid and crisis management.
Nepal’s government is giving $1,000 to the families of the dead plus $400 for burial costs.
The United Nations said more than 8 million people had been affected by the earthquake and at least 2 million had been displaced.
The International Committee of the Red Cross has created a website for friends and family to report missing loved ones or search for those who have checked in.
Survivors found
In the capital Thursday, rescue workers pulled out two survivors from the rubble, rare moments of joy in the grisly recovery process.
Cheers rang out as rescuers pulled 15-year-old boy Pemba Tamang from a demolished guest house. Hours later, a hotel kitchen worker, a woman in her 30s, Krishna Devi Khadka, also was pulled to safety.
The youth, caked in dust, was fitted with a neck brace before he was carried away on a stretcher and raced to a field hospital. But health care workers said he had suffered only minor cuts and bruises. The boy said he stayed alive by eating a jar of ghee – clarified butter – that he found in the darkness of the debris he was trapped in.
The boy described his horror as the earthquake occurred last Saturday. I tried to run but… something fell on my head and I lost consciousness — I’ve no idea for how long, he said. When I came round, I was trapped under the debris and there was total darkness. I heard other people’s voices screaming out for help around me… but I felt helpless.
Rescue workers said the woman they found was conscious and talking, with one saying, It is as though she had been born again.
Major loss
VOA correspondent Steve Herman visited the village of Majigaon, northeast of Kathmandu, where he said people are dealing with the destruction of every building, along with the major loss of their livestock. He said they also are not getting much outside help.
There has been scant and fleeting presence in this part of the country, he said. We were told that a team of about five Singaporeans stopped by yesterday to give first aid. They were here for less than 20 minutes, and that has been it so far here in this particular village on the banks of the Indrawati river.
World Food Program chief Ertharin Cousin traveled to Nepal Thursday to see first hand the WFP’s relief operation. While in Nepal, Cousin will meet with government officials and humanitarians involved in the relief effort. She will travel to remote locations where WFP is delivering food.
Historic sites heavily damaged
Authorities are also trying to assess the quake’s destruction at many of Nepal’s ancient historical sites. Christian Manhart, UNESCO representative to Nepal, said at least three of Kathmandu’s seven World Heritage sites were very, very heavily destroyed.
But Manhart tells VOA he is optimistic many of the centuries-old sites can be restored.
I have some hope that restoration can be very successful, because in the rubble we have all the architectural features. So what cracked down is mainly the brick walls. And the statues and the wooden beams which are very beautifully carved in most of these temples, all of them are there, he said.
Manhart said UNESCO is still trying to determine the extent of the damage. He estimates that it could take more than 10 years to restore the World Heritage sites.
For now, though, much of the priority is on the country’s dire humanitarian situation.
UN appeals for assistance
The U.N. launched an urgent appeal Wednesday for $415 million to provide shelter for 500,000 people who are sleeping out in the open, as well as medicine, water and food for millions affected by the earthquake. The U.N. said the disaster destroyed 130,000 houses and damaged thousands more.
In addition, the U.N. Food and Agricultural Organization said $8 million is urgently needed to help Nepalese farmers recover their losses and assist them with the imminent rice growing season.
On Wednesday, President Barack Obama discussed aid efforts in a telephone call with Nepal’s Prime Minister Sushil Koirala. The U.S. is providing more than $10 million for both immediate efforts, such as clean water and search and rescue operations, and for long-term recovery efforts.
People in Kathmandu continued leaving Thursday by bus to reach their families in remote areas that were hardest hit by the magnitude 7.8 earthquake.
Many in Nepal have been frustrated by what they say is a slow response by the government. Several hundred people protested Wednesday by blocking traffic in Kathmandu.
Ira Mellman contributed to this story.
