16 injured after strong earthquake hits north-western Japan

Japanese authorities said on Wednesday that at least 16 people were injured after a magnitude-6.7 earthquake struck north-western Japan, prompting the government to issue a tsunami warning, the Deutsche Presse-Agentur, dpa, reported.

The Meteorological Agency lifted a tsunami warning early Wednesday after 1-metre tsunami waves that it had predicted were not observed on the coasts of Ishikawa, Niigata and Yamagata prefectures.

The agency still warned of aftershocks and mudslides following the 10:22-pm (13:22 GMT Tuesday) quake whose seismic centre was off the coast of Yamagata prefecture at a depth of about 14 kilometres.

The agency revised the magnitude of the quake to 6.7 from an initial reading of 6.8. The quake caused power failures with about 9,000 households without power temporarily in the prefectures of Yamagata and Niigata, according to Tohoku Electric Power.

Follow Emirates 24|7 on Google News.