Vice Premier Hui Liangyu on Wednesday asked local Party and government officials to properly divide quake control and relief tasks to ensure they were efficiently carried out.

Touring Qingchuan, a county hard hit by the May 12 quake and torn by aftershocks, Hui emphasized the importance of establishing a responsibility system, alongside tightened leadership and supervision of the relief work.

Qingchuan and Beichuan were two worst affected areas in the 8.0-magnitude quake, centered on Wenchuan county in Sichuan Province.

The death toll is already more than 68,000 and is certain to rise further, with almost 20,000 listed as missing.

In Qingchuan alone, 4,687 people were confirmed dead, 136 are missing, 15,413 injured, and 250,000 homeless.

There were 8,911 aftershocks recorded by midday on Wednesday, concentrated on Wenchuan, Beichuan and Qingchuan, which sit on the faultline.

Around 4:03 p.m. on Tuesday, Qingchuan County was struck by a magnitude 5.4 aftershock, leaving more than 60 people injured and about 400,000 houses destroyed. It was also the epicenter of a magnitude 6.4 aftershock on Sunday afternoon, the strongest since the May 12 earthquake.

During his stay in Qingchuan on Wednesday, Hui visited shelters to accommodate displaced residents and a tented primary school, and listened to work reports on quake control and relief efforts by officials of Guangyuan City and Qingchuan County.

"The work to accommodate quake-affected residents, and other reconstruction tasks remain arduous and painstaking," he said. "It is necessary to be aware of difficulties ahead and to be psychologically prepared for a long-term struggle."

(Xinhua News Agency May 29, 2008)