Uzbekistan: Earthquake Rocks Ferghana Valley

US Geological Survey

Earthquake in Ferghana Valley on July 20, 2011 at 01:35:43 AM at epicenter

A strong earthquake has rocked Central Asia, Reuters reported .

Although sometimes events of this nature are not reported in the official media, the Uzbek state media immediately covered an earthquake registering 5 points on the Richter scale in Tashkent that "woke up the majority of residents" there, the state news site gazeta.uz reported.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the magnitude of the quake was 6.1

The quake was felt throughout the Ferghana Valley, on both sides of the Kyrgyz-Uzbekistan border, and the epicenter was reported to be in Kyrgyzstan near the Uzbek border.

Samarkand registered 3 points, and Termez reported 4 points, the Uzbek government website gazeta.uz reported. Termez is the town where a German air base is located which is the main transit point for the delivery of goods to Afghanistan to supply NATO troops.

No casualties have been reported.

The commercial news portal 12.uz, which often takes a pro-government stance, published the same information as official wire services which said that some people in Dushanbe, Bishkek, and Tashkent temporarily left their homes. But despite the emergency, 12.uz couldn't resist taking a swipe at Uzbekistan's neighbors, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, with whom it has long been in dispute over energy issues, and which it said "weren't backing down from their plans to build grandiose dams in dangerous seismological zones."