In pictures: China earthquake

Rescuers have continued searching into the night for victims of a powerful earthquake that struck south-west China's Sichuan province at about 1430 (0630GMT).

Thousands of people have been killed and many more injured. Casualty figures from some areas were slow to come through.

Hundreds of students were in Juyuan Middle School in Dujiangyan city, near the earthquake's epicentre, when the building collapsed in the quake.

Hundreds of other people are feared to have been buried in the rubble of collapsed houses, schools and factories in densely-populated Sichuan.

Photographers have captured images of the effects in cities like Dujiangyan but the fate of more remote areas is still to be determined.

Officials said 80% of the buildings in Beichuan county, close to the epicentre, had been destroyed.

China's President Hu Jintao called for an "all out" effort to help earthquake victims. Within two hours of the quake, Premier Wen Jiabao was flying to Sichuan to oversee relief work.

The 7.8 quake shook buildings here in Chongqing city and was felt as far away as Beijing, Shanghai and the Thai capital, Bangkok.

People evacuated offices and hospitals in Sichuan's provincial capital, Chengdu, 92km (57 miles) from the quake's epicentre.

The earthquake created a crack in this building in Lanzhou, in the north-western province of Gansu, hundreds of kilometres from the epicentre.

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