AN earthquake measuring 7 degrees on the Richter open scale, with its epicenter in the Peruvian selva and which was felt in Colombia, Brazil and Ecuador, provoked one death and 11 injuries, according to official sources, EFE reports.

The Peruvian Geophysics Institute reported that the quake was registered at 20:55 hrs local time on Sunday (01.55GMT on Monday) and that its epicenter was located 85 kilometers from Moyabamba, a city affected by the last earthquake in 1990 that left 135 people dead and more than 800 injured.

The city most affected by the quake is Tarapoto, capital of the San Martín department, with 180,000 inhabitants. The walls of a bar in Lamas, Tarapoto collapsed, killing one person and injuring 11.

Lamas, on a hill 20 minutes by highway from Tarapoto, is a Quechua-speaking town of 8,000 inhabitants, who took refuge in the selva in their flight from the Incas in the 13th century.

More than half of the buildings in Lamas, built of earth and cane, were affected by the earthquake, a police spokesman informed EFE, adding that a fear of repeats was robbing its inhabitants of sleep during the night.

Both Tarapota and Moyobamba, located in Peru’s high selva and close to the border with Brazil, are seismic areas, being located on a fault in the eastern part of the Andes’ Cordillera Azul.

The earthquake was felt with much intensity in the cities of Lima, Piura, Chiclayo, Trujillo and Iquitos, all of them venues for the Under-17’s Soccer World Championship , EFE confirms, as well as in the neighboring countries of Ecuador, Colombia and Brazil.

The populations of Moyobama, Yurimaguas, Rioja, Chachapoyas, Baguas, Juanjuí, Bellavista and Nueva Cajamarca are also sleeping in squares and sports installations for fear of the quake, which left them without an electricity or telephone service for a number of hours.

Hernando Tavera, head of the Peruvian Geophysics Institute, said that the epicenter of the earthquake was at a depth of 100 kilometers, "a fact that explains the magnitude" of the tremor, although he also considered that this fact "is reducing its destructive capacity."