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Overcrowded hospitals in northwest Iran struggled to cope on Monday with thousands injured by a pair of powerful earthquakes that killed at least 306 people and wrecked scores of villages.

Thousands huddled in makeshift camps or slept in parks after Saturday's quakes for fear of more aftershocks, 60 of which had already struck. A lack of tents and other supplies left them exposed to the night chill, one witness said.

Doctors in Tabriz, the city of Ardabil and other towns worked flat out and roads to the cities were clogged with traffic as relatives ferried the injured from the outlying villages which were worst affected by the twin quakes. Long queues formed at the hospitals.

"From last night until this afternoon when I left Shohada-ye Tabriz hospital, doctors were constantly performing operations. It was a horrific tragedy but people and officials did all they could," a doctor working in Tabriz said by telephone.

"Ordinary people were working alongside rescuers. They were bringing food and water to the hospital. Some were using their cars to bring the relatives of those injured to the hospital."

The worst damage and most casualties appeared to have been in villages around the towns of Ahar, Varzaghan and Harees, near Tabriz, Iranian media said.

Tabriz resident Ahmad said his cousin living in a village near Ahar had been killed.

"Nobody knows what happened to his wife and two daughters," aged 4 and 7, Ahmad said. "We fear that if rescuers don't get to them soon, they will lose their lives too if they're still alive ... People in those villages need help."

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei urged officials on Sunday night to help those affected by the earthquakes which the US Geological Survey said measured 6.4 and 6.3 magnitude and struck 11 minutes apart, northeast of Tabriz.

The city is an important trading hub far from Iran's oil-producing areas and known nuclear facilities. Buildings inside Tabriz are substantially built and there were no injuries.

But homes in the villages are often made of concrete blocks or mud brick that can crumble and collapse in a strong quake.

（中國日報網英語點津 Helen 編輯）

About the broadcaster:

Rosie Tuck is a copy editor at the China Daily website. She was born in New Zealand and graduated from Auckland University of Technology with a Bachelor of Communications studies majoring in journalism and television. In New Zealand she was working as a junior reporter for the New Zealand state broadcaster TVNZ. She is in Beijing on an Asia New Zealand Foundation grant, working as a journalist in the English news department at the China Daily website.