AhlulBayt News Agency: Hundreds of Indonesians have prayed out in the open next to rice paddies and in the streets after an earthquake flattened their town in western Java and left 310 members of their community dead.
Muslim cleric Muhamad Jamhur led a congregation in prayer in an outdoor volleyball court just 200 metres from a mosque where walls were left cracked and windows shattered by the shallow 5.6-magnitude quake that hit the town of Cianjur, about 75km south of the capital Jakarta, earlier this week.
"After the disaster, we are still afraid," the 52-year-old said.
"So we had to move here in this volleyball court, not in a mosque. I asked the congregation to stay on guard because disaster might strike again."
Hundreds of aftershocks have rattled the mountainous region, where grieving and traumatised residents are sheltering in tents, awaiting supplies of food, water, and medicines that have been slowed by heavy rains and landslides.
Food vendor Asep Hidayat, who like many others lost his house in the quake, said he was thankful to be able to join in the prayers, even if not in a mosque.
"Prayer still needs to go on, even though we are in a shelter, prayer is an obligation," he said.
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Muslim cleric Muhamad Jamhur led a congregation in prayer in an outdoor volleyball court just 200 metres from a mosque where walls were left cracked and windows shattered by the shallow 5.6-magnitude quake that hit the town of Cianjur, about 75km south of the capital Jakarta, earlier this week.
"After the disaster, we are still afraid," the 52-year-old said.
"So we had to move here in this volleyball court, not in a mosque. I asked the congregation to stay on guard because disaster might strike again."
Hundreds of aftershocks have rattled the mountainous region, where grieving and traumatised residents are sheltering in tents, awaiting supplies of food, water, and medicines that have been slowed by heavy rains and landslides.
Food vendor Asep Hidayat, who like many others lost his house in the quake, said he was thankful to be able to join in the prayers, even if not in a mosque.
"Prayer still needs to go on, even though we are in a shelter, prayer is an obligation," he said.
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