(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-05-17 03:12

BEICHUAN - An aftershock brought new havoc to the earthquake-stricken region of China on Friday, as it struggled to bury some of its estimated 50,000 dead, dig out more survivors and help thousands of injured and homeless.

President Hu Jintao flew to the battered province of Sichuan and Premier Wen Jiabao said the quake damage could exceed that of the devastating 1976 tremor in the northeastern city of Tangshan.

Wen called on officials to ensure social stability as frustration and exhaustion grew among survivors, many of whom have lost everything and are living in tents or in the open.

The death toll had increased to more than 22,000 by Friday afternoon but the toll would eventually exceed 50,000.

Thousands of men, women and children were heading on foot for Mianyang, a city near the epicentre, saying they were abandoning their ruined villages for good.

Hu and Wen stressed that searching for survivors remained the top priority.

"We cannot talk about giving up too easily," Wen said. "Life should go on. I believe people in the quake area can definitely build their hometowns even better with their own hands. That is also the biggest consolation for the dead."

Thousands of residents from Beichuan, one of the places worst hit, streamed away from the town carrying babies, bags and suitcases.

The town was a scene of devastation, with virtually every building either demolished or damaged beyond habitation.

Buckled Roads, Landslides

The aftershock hit Lixian, to the west of the epicentre in Wenchuan, cutting newly repaired roads and telecommunications.

"A number of vehicles were buried in landslides. The casualties were not known," Xinhua news agency said, adding four of its reporters narrowly escaped death when a house collapsed.

China has mobilised 130,000 troops to the disaster area, but with buckled and blocked roads, supplies and rescuers have struggled to reach the worst-hit areas.

Offers of help have also flooded in. The first foreign rescue teams, from Japan, Russia, South Korea and Singapore and China's Taiwan have arrived in Sichuan province.

The World Food Programme said it was sending enough ready-to-eat meals for 118,000 people.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon announced emergency funds of up to $7 millions and said more would be available.

Xinhua said 33 people were dug out of the rubble in Beichuan still alive on Friday.

Peng Zhijun, 46, had eaten cigarettes and paper napkins and had drunk his urine to survive. A 50-year-old worker was rescued from a collapsed fertiliser plant after being trapped for 100 hours, a witness said.

In Dujiangyan, a school collapse buried 900 students. In Wufu, a primary school collapsed, killing about 300.

Rescuers found two girls, one in a coma and the other dead, holding hands in the ruins of their school, Xinhua said.

Housing Minister Jiang Weixin said the schools had not been designed to withstand such a powerful earthquake.

"At this stage we cannot rule out the possibility that there has been shoddy work and inferior materials," Jiang told a news conference in Beijing.

There were also concerns about epidemics if the dead were not soon buried or cremated.

"A lot of tourists have been killed. We don't know how to deal with the bodies, some of which have been highly decomposed, but their relatives will come to look for them," an army officer in the badly hit Yinmugou resort in Pengzhou told Sichuan TV.

"I am really worried about epidemics," he said.

Hundreds of damaged dams have also raised fears of collapse and flooding of areas struggling to recover from the quake.