Strong earthquake shakes Taiwan – tsunami warning in Japan and the Philippines. Houses on the island of Hualien tipped to one side, rail traffic in the capital Taipei was stopped.
Taiwan lies in an earthquake-prone zone on the border of the Eurasian plate and the Philippine Sea plate. According to Taiwan's official news agency, the quake was the strongest on the Island since 1999, when a magnitude 7.6 quake killed around 2,400 people. The tremor off Taiwan triggered a warning of a three-meter-high tsunami for nearby islands in Okinawa Prefecture, southwestern Japan.