Talking to various TV channels DG ISPR and spokesman to the President, Major General Shaukat Sultan said that according to the reports so far received from the calamity hit areas, 19,000 persons, including two hundred army men, have been killed and over 43,000 injured and he added that the death toll could rise.
The government has established a fund under the name 'President's Relief Fund for Earthquake Victims 2005' for which World Bank has announced $23 million, including IDB ($10 million) and China ($6.2 million), and Ireland, Canada, and USA also contributing.
The Federal Cabinet held an emergency meeting here on Sunday morning to review the rescue and relief operations and decided to increase the relief money from Rs 1 billion to Rs 5 billion.
Talking to newsmen after the meeting, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said that the country would observe three-day mourning to express solidarity with the people who lost their relatives in "this worst natural disaster."
He said that the Cabinet would meet daily to review the rehabilitation work and federal ministers have been assigned special responsibilities to supervise the relief operations.
The Prime Minister said that the government has decided to pay Rs 100,000 for loss of each person to the bereaved families and would utilise all resources for help of the affectees and restoration of the infrastructure, which had been badly damaged in the earthquake.
Shaukat Aziz hoped that the road-link between Islamabad and Muzaffarabad would be restored on Monday morning from Abbotabad side, facilitating transportation of relief goods and shifting of injured to the hospitals.
The Prime Minister said that there was complete co-operation and co-ordination between the federal and provincial governments regarding the relief and rehabilitation work.
He said that the government would welcome assistance from its friends and thanked those who generously contributed towards the relief fund.
AGENCIES ADD: Rescuers searched frantically in the rubble of flattened towns and villages on Sunday for survivors from the devastating earthquake.
In worst hit Northern Areas, more than 24 hours after Saturday morning's quake, hundreds of children were trapped in collapsed schools, and 150 people, including foreigners, were buried in Margalla Towers rubble in the capital, Islamabad.
Rescue teams and ordinary citizens laboured with cranes and earth-moving equipment or used their bare hands in desperate search for survivors, some complaining bitterly about lack of assistance from badly stretched central government officials.
About 19,400 people were killed and more than 42,000 hurt in Pakistan, said Interior Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao, with Azad Kashmir and its capital Muzaffarabad being the worst hit.
But Communications Minister of Azad Kashmir, Tariq Farooq, said the toll there alone could reach 30,000 as the focus so far had been only on main towns, not on mountain villages.
In Muzaffarabad, most houses, government buildings and shops collapsed and frightened residents spent a chilly night camped in fields, parks, graveyards and cars.
Amongst countless tragic sights, perhaps most pitiful were those of hundreds of parents using picks, shovels and their bare hands in desperate attempts to reach 850 children trapped in the rubble of two schools in the NWFP.
The frightened voices of trapped children and the anguished wails of parents accompanied the frantic work in the Balakot valley.
"Save me, call my mother, call my father," came the faint voice of a boy, again and again, from the rubble of a government school in which residents said about 200 children were trapped.
"Bring out my child, bring out my child," his mother wailed, beating her chest as other parents and relatives pulled out the bodies of four children, bringing Sunday morning's toll to eight.
Rescue efforts were hampered by frequent aftershocks causing panic among survivors, many of whom face a bleak immediate future with little or no food or shelter.
"I've been involved in helping refugees for the last 17 years, but I am in shock because I have never seen such devastation," said German aid agency doctor Chris Schmoter in Balakot, where almost every second woman or child bore an injury.
As many as twenty-six helicopters including fifteen of Pakistan Army Aviation, three of PAF, three of Cabinet Division and four of Ministry of Interior are participating in the rescue operation being carried out in quake-hit areas of Azad Kashmir, Northern Areas and the NWFP.
Besides this, the effort is being augmented by three Y-12 aircraft of Army Aviation and two of PAF.
Nine MI-17 helicopters are carrying out rescue operations in Azad Kashmir while six are employed in the NWFP.
Early Sunday morning six tonnes of rations and same quantity of medicines, hundreds of blankets and tents, 200 crates of drinking water, donated by Cantonment Board Rawalpindi, were dispatched to the affected areas of Muzaffarabad, Rawlakot and Bagh in helicopters.
While the Pakistan Army troops deployed in forward areas along the Line of Control are carrying out rescue operations in their designated areas, additional Army troops were flown to Muzaffarabad, Sarupa and Bagh to carry out such operations.
Similarly two infantry battalions along with medical teams have immediately started rescue operations in Mansehra, and its surrounding areas Battal and Balakot. Army engineers are actively engaged in re-establishing the communication infrastructure at various places in Azad Kashmir. Efforts are being made to reopen Arja-Bagh-Hajipir and Azad Pattan-Hajira-Bandi Roads. Work is also underway to reopen the Kaghan Valley road from Naran and Balakot directions. Efforts are also underway by Frontier Works Organisation (FWO) to repair Karakoram Highway between Batgram and Rajkot.
Ghari Habibullah-Muzaffarabad Road was opened by the FWO for light traffic later in the afternoon on Sunday. A Dispatch Base has been established at the PAF Base Chaklala to receive and dispatch relief goods. Representatives of the various arms and services of Pakistan Army along with PAF men and officers are assisting in the process. A team of thirty doctors along with six tonnes of medicines were flown to Muzaffarabad early Sunday morning. Fourteen doctors were flown to Rawlakot and medical teams in Murree and Abbottabad have been reinforced to treat the injured in affected areas.
All Military Hospitals of Rawalpindi, Abbottabad, Jhelum and Kharian are receiving the casualties being brought from forward areas of Kashmir and Northern Areas. As many as 119 seriously injured patients, mostly women and children brought from Azad Kashmir were operated upon on Sunday at Combined Military Hospita1 Rawalpindi while over one hundred were operated upon for major surgery in Military Hospital Rawalpindi.