BAM!

The State Department said that while direct contact was appropriate "given the urgency of this situation," it should not be interpreted as an effort to thaw relations with a country once described by President Bush as part of an "axis of evil."

"There is no political angle," said State Department spokesman Lou Fintor. "There is a human catastrophe in Iran and our only mission is to alleviate the human suffering associated with yesterday's earthquake. These efforts will not alter the tone or intensity of our dialogue with the Iranians on other matters of grave concern."

The search for survivors in the earthquake that devastated Iran's southeastern city of Bam will end Sunday, the United Nations said, adding that international rescue teams were no longer needed.

Geneva-AP -- Sixteen countries, including the United States, have sent experts to Iran to search for earthquake victims. But the lead Swiss team is pulling out -- saying it's unlikely any more survivors will be found.

The Swiss Disaster Dog Association was the first team to arrive in Bam after Friday's quake. It didn't find any survivors.

Statistics indicate that it is rare for people to survive in earthquake rubble for more than three days.

The head of Switzerland's overall relief operation says rescuers encountered a catastrophe. He says Bam is "90 percent destroyed" and that victims were crushed, suffocated or frozen in the rubble of their mudbrick homes.

Swedes=a misspeak.
I referred to the Swiss, but of course, you knew that.

OK.
It's one of those snowy, no fighting countries.

Still, people could be covered or caught in warmer pockets.... I hate to give up when there's a chance someone is hanging on to life.

THE Red Crescent has implored international rescue teams to stay in Bam, claiming that as many as 1,000 people could still be alive in the wreckage of the city destroyed in last Friday's earthquake.

Ukraine's Dr. Victor Kozachkov, left, and nurse Natasha Bondarchuk, right, examine
survivor of Friday's earthquake Hoosein Qale Khani, 27, who was pulled out from
rubble two days ago as his wife Jamileh, stands at the mobile hospital of the centeral
militarized rescue detachment of the Ukraine in Bam city about 1,000 kms southeast
of Tehran Thursday Jan. 1, 2004.
(AP Photo/Hasan Sarbakhshian)


Three More Iranian Quake Survivors Found

Jan 1, 2:08 PM (ET)

By MATTHEW PENNINGTON


BAM, Iran (AP) - Rescue workers pulled three more survivors from the rubble of Bam's devastating earthquake, including a man saved Thursday after nearly seven days buried under a flattened house. Relief crews restored some electricity and rushed more aid into the ruined ancient city ...