Earthquake hits Indonesia's Sulawesi island

Jakarta, Jun 25: A powerful undersea earthquake with a magnitude of 5.8 struck off the Indonesian island of Sulawesi today, but the state meteorology and geophysics agency said there were no reports of casualties or damage.

An agency official said the quake's epicentre was 72 km beneath the sea bed, about 110 km from the city of Gorontalo in northern Sulawesi. It did not generate a tsunami.

Huge landslides and flooding caused by torrential rains killed more than 200 people in Sulawesi this week, but that was in the southern part of the island.

Earthquakes are frequent in Indonesia, the world's fourth most populous country. A massive earthquake in December 2004 triggered a tsunami that left 170,000 people killed or missing in Aceh province.

A quake with a 6.2 magnitude shook the island of Java late last month, killing more than 5,700 and leaving thousands homeless in and around Yogyakarta.

Indonesia's 17,000 islands sprawl along a belt of intense volcanic and seismic activity, part of what is called the ''Pacific Ring of Fire.''

REUTERS