# Approximately three-thousand-600 military personnel have been mobilised in an effort to expedite rescue and relief efforts following a 6.8 magnitude earthquake that struck southern Japan on Tuesday. Thirteen people have died, while an unconfirmed number of people are trapped at the Aeon Mall in Kumamoto. Nine people remain missing at the Nippon Paper factory in Yatsushiro City. Around two-thousand police officers and about one-thousand fire service members have also been deployed to help with the rescue effort. Japan’s prime minister Sanae Takaichi says this is truly a race against time.
Japan’s prime minister says rescue efforts are still ongoing in ‘race against time’ following earthquake