CaptionA displaced girl some three weeks after the earthquake that racked the Kashmir region on October 8. She leads a mule carrying her belongings. Balakot was one of the towns hardest hit by the quake. Barely a building was left standing in what had once been a popular tourist destination. The city was renowned for the beauty of its situation at the entrance to the steep, thickly forested Kaghan Valley. It was also an object of pilgrimage as it was the location of the mausoleums of two Muslim martyrs.
