Evacuation of Tibetan town begins after quake

The evacuation of thousands of people who were trapped in a Tibetan town on the Nepal border began Wednesday after its entry highway was cleared of obstructions.

Access to Zham Town in Nyalam County, southwest China's Tibet Autonomous Region, was cut off until Tuesday after the 8.1-magnitude earthquake in Nepal on Saturday and the subsequent aftershocks.

The risk of more landslides is high, so on Wednesday the rescue headquarters decided to begin to evacuate the nearly 6,000 people in Zham.

As of 3:40 p.m., more than 2,000 had been evacuated, mainly to Lhatse County and the suburbs of Xigaze City.

More than 600 tents had been set up at the resettlement site in Lhatse for the first batch of displaced residents.

As this site will likely be home to around 2,500 people for at least a year and a half more tents will be set up in the following days.

"We are also prepared to build makeshift houses in the future," said Zhang Jingsong, deputy head of the resettlement site.

Several foreign tourists were also trapped in Zham Town, which is an important customs checkpoint.

Jan Pryor, a tourist from Australia, told Xinhua that although she and local Tibetans did not speak the same language, friendliness was international.

As of Wednesday midday, the death toll in Tibet was 25, with 4 missing and 797 injured, according to the local publicity department.

The quake toppled 2,535 houses and damaged 25,821 others across 19 counties, affecting nearly 300,000 people, among whom 52,433 were displaced. A total of 85 temples were also damaged.