The death toll from the May 12 earthquake increased by 88 overnight to 69,107 as of Tuesday noon, the Information Office of the State Council said.

Another 373,577 people were counted as injured and 18,230 still listed as missing from the 8.0-magnitude quake, while 45.69 million people were affected by the disaster.

Hospitals had treated 94,565 injured people, of whom 70,657 had been discharged, 21,342 were still being treated and 9,781 were transferred outside of Sichuan Province, the center of the quake, for treatment.

By Monday, more than 1 million quake survivors had been found and evacuated by rescuers.

On Tuesday, the Ministry of Civil Affairs announced guidelines on the issue of quake orphans, which said priority should be given to relatives when it came to providing custody.

Adoption, foster families and welfare homes would be other options, it said.

As of last Friday, the number of unattached children stood at 1,869 in Sichuan, according to the provincial civil affairs department.

Relief supplies continued to pour into the quake zone. As of Tuesday noon, 749,200 tents, 4.42 million quilts, 11.70 million garments, 676,600 tons of fuel oil and 1.42 million tons of coal had been sent.

The office said that as of Monday, relief workers had built 15,500 temporary houses and another 10,600 were being put together, while the material for 45,700 makeshift houses had arrived in the affected areas.

As of Tuesday noon, domestic and foreign donations had reached 42.36 billion yuan (about 6.1 billion U.S. dollars). The government disaster relief fund had exceeded 23.07 billion yuan, including 18.68 billion yuan from the central budget and 4.39 billion yuan from local budgets.

So far, 12.1 billion yuan, in cash and materials, had been forwarded to the earthquake-affected areas, the office said.

As of Tuesday noon, electricity was mostly back in one more county of Sichuan. Power was also partially restored in the seven worst-hit counties.

In the 24 hours ended at noon Tuesday, 171 aftershocks were monitored in the quake zone, according to the China Seismological Bureau. Only one measured above 4.0 on the Richter scale. Since the primary quake, 10,068 aftershocks have been detected.

(Xinhua News Agency June 3, 2008)