United Nations urges relief efforts in Myanmar as earthquake death toll rises

Myanmar earthquake death toll rises to 3,354 as UN agencies and foreign donors increase relief efforts.

The death toll from last week’s massive earthquake in Myanmar has risen to 3,354, state media said on Saturday (April 5, 2025), as United Nations agencies and foreign aid donors continued to ramp up their emergency relief efforts.

The 7.7 magnitude quake hit a wide swath of the country, causing significant damage to six regions and states including the capital Naypyitaw.

Editorial: Lessons from a quake: on the Myanmar earthquake

The earthquake left many areas without power, telephone or cell connections and damaged roads and bridges, making the full extent of the devastation hard to assess.

It also worsened an already dire humanitarian crisis triggered by the country's civil war that has internally displaced more than 3 million people and left nearly 20 million in need, according to the United Nations.

The military government's leader, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, has said the earthquake was the second most powerful in the country's recorded history after a magnitude 8 quake east of Mandalay in May 1912.

A report in the state-run Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper on Saturday (April 5, 2025) said that the death toll from the March 28 disaster has reached 3,354, with 4,850 injured and 220 missing. It also said rescuers had saved 653 survivors trapped under the debris.