Remote, devastated villages require most support

I left Pingwu county on Thursday with a heavy heart, having spent the night before seeking refuge from the downpour in a tent.

My thoughts were with the 31,000 children in the remote county, some 300 km from the May 12 earthquake's epicenter.

Of the 25 towns in the county, which is located in the quake zone, four had been utterly flattened, while the rest, as the locals put it, have become "debris still standing". The county has more than 400 rivers, and more than 90 percent of its land is more than 1,000 meters above sea level. The area is also sparsely populated, with around 30 people per sq km.