More than 1,100 homes have been damaged in the six eastern dzongkhags by the September 21 earthquake, according to latest reports, compelling thousands of people to spend another night out in the open.

Dorji

The Indian institute of technology in Rourkee, India, has done a seismic hazard map of Bhutan showing, for the first time, hazard zones in the event of an earthquake.

Thousands of people in the eastern dzongkhags spent the night out in the open after a powerful earthquake, which hit yesterday afternoon, damaged homes, government offices, historical monuments, blocked roads and reportedly killed at least 12 people as of 9:30 pm last night.

A 6.3-magnitude earthquake has killed at least seven people in the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan, officials have said.

Ugyen Tenzing, the country's director of disaster management, said rescuers were searching for survivors under the debris of collapsed buildings in the eastern districts of Munggar and Trashigang.

A medium-intensity earthquake shook Assam, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Bhutan and north Bangladesh on Monday afternoon and killed atleast 10 persons, including three Indians, in Bhutan. The tremor made people, scared by reports that a major earthquake would hit the region in near future, run out of homes and offices.

Records with the gup of Lumang gewog in Trashigang show that 128 households from four of its villages have abandoned their homes for resettlement elsewhere in the country.

Drying streams, lesser snowfall, and dengue fever cases in Thimphu, the March 26 rain and storm. All these are indication that climate change is happening here in Bhutan, said the deputy minister of national environment commission, Dasho Nado Rinchen.

The global swine flu pandemic will expose the failure of the international community to invest in health protection in poor countries, the world's top health official warned here yesterday.

With the rains gone, farmers in Dagana are estimating the damage caused by heavy and continuous rain last month, which include cultivated paddy fields, maize crops, irrigation channels and citrus mandarin (orange) trees.

Six of the dzongkhag