IRAN: Mehdi Huseyn-Momenei stands next to the ruins of his house as a bitterly cold wind whips down from the mountain side. His wife and children are huddled around a small fire, lamenting their lost loved ones, writes Angus McDowall in Kerman Province, Iran
"Many people have died," says Mr Huseyn-Momenei, the baker of Islamabad village in Kerman province.
"I was sleeping and was buried under the rubble for about 20 minutes. The children were alive thank God, but I have lost two brothers and my mother." Across the road, an alleyway of destruction winds between fallen adobe houses. Shattered parts of vaulted and domed roofs stand above rooms that were laid open by Tuesday morning's earthquake, which devastated villages in the area around Zerand and killed possibly up to 550 people, Interior Minister Abdolvahed Mousavi-Lari said yesterday.
Canvas tents are being put up in courtyards where grief-stricken villagers mourn their dead and prepare for a life of homelessness.
A young woman is crying and her mother whispers "welcome, welcome to our home", her voice hoarse from screaming. She gestures to a collapsed room. Posters of Iranian pop stars are sellotaped to the wall and bits of plaster lie on top of blankets that were quickly thrown aside as the residents leapt from their beds to safety. "All we've had today is a little tea, we have only help from God," she says.
"It is so cold. The children will fall ill." In another house in the alleyway, an old man comes out of a tent and says his children have died. He walks away weeping. An old woman clambers over a wall carrying a samovar to make tea. Nearby a family loads possessions into a large green truck as they prepare to leave for a safer area. With aftershocks still trembling the region, few residents felt able to sleep inside even in the few houses that were still undamaged.
A pomegranate tree stands next to a green canvas tent being erected in the courtyard. Many of the locals farm that fruit, as well as pistachios, for which the province is famous. Large white hailstones are falling lightly to the ground. Mist hangs in the air, reducing visibility to about 50 metres. Men drive past on mopeds, black scarves wrapped tightly about their heads against the cold.
The road from Islamabad winds up a steep mountain side between high cliffs. Telephone and electricity poles are bent over at 45 degrees. Deep cracks run across the middle of the road, some as much as two inches wide. Further up the mountain, it passes a coalmine before turning into a boggy mud track saturated with the heavy rain of recent days. Landslides and fallen boulders were only cleared six hours after the earthquake, rendering the village of Houdkan far above almost inaccessible to aid.
At the entrance to the village, a line of corpses are wrapped in brightly coloured blankets. A family is huddled nearby. Children stand mutely, staring at the bodies as they are loaded one by one into pick-up trucks to be taken to Zerand for burial.
The heavy mist casts a ghostly atmosphere across the stricken village, which winds down a steep hillside that has turned to mud. It is a horrific scene; a slope of rubble, mud and death.
"I was out working on the road when the earthquake came," said Hadi Mirzai, standing with two other villagers atop the shattered roof of a collapsed house. "I came home and everything was broken. I've lost half my family."
Bits of wall and telephone poles poke up into the fog. Rescue workers in army fatigues and Red Crescent bibs work with spades to dig through the rubble for more bodies.
The wall of a room has been torn open, revealing a fireplace with wellington boots and a thermos flask placed neatly in a niche above. Further down the hillside, a brightly painted metal chest stands on its end with kitchen implements and cushions scattered about.
Goats, donkeys and cows wander aimlessly up and down the slope looking for feed. Several bodies of cows can be seen protruding from the fallen debris. Large trees have been twisted apart and lie broken on the ground.
Large holes appear suddenly underfoot as what seemed to be pathways are revealed as the weak roofs of broken houses. People sink to their shins in mud.
A group of rescue workers has gathered around a pile of rubble about midway up the slope. They are digging into a crater in the middle, which is revealed as the kitchen of a house. They say they have found a body and a small patch of cloth is revealed as they sift the earth gently away with their spades. A hand is revealed and workers reach down and pull. The body is brought from the ground and the workers chant a prayer.
It is an elderly man with white hair. A powerful smell is released as his torso is dragged clear. The body is brought out and placed on a Red Crescent stretcher to be taken to join the line of bodies at the entrance to the village. The workers keep digging: they believe more bodies might lie beneath.
The army and Red Crescent arrived in large numbers at most of the villages within hours. But their numbers have been bolstered by ordinary citizens from neighbouring areas who rushed to help the people living in neighbouring cities.
Amir Mohammedi came up from Zerand to help. He had been woken early by his mother for the morning prayer when suddenly the room "started dancing". Things fell from the walls but the house was sound and his family survived unhurt.