Haitian minister: Over 150,000 dead in capital after earthquake

January 25, 2010

The Haitian government Communications Minister states that over 150,000 people in, the country's capital, are confirmed dead from the recent magnitude 7.0 earthquake there.

Minister Marie-Laurence Jocelyn Lassegue commented that the figure is based on corpses found and collected in the city by a state company, CNE.

"Nobody knows how many bodies are buried in the rubble &mdash; 200,000, 300,000? Who knows the overall death toll?" the Associated Press reports Lassegue as commenting.

Yesterday, the United Nations reported the Haitian government found 111,481 bodies recovered from rubble. Meanwhile, at least 75,000 corpses have been buried in mass graves. The government officially announced on Saturday that its search for survivors buried beneath buildings had ended; the focus is now on getting aid to survivors.