The victims included a policeman on duty at the local parliament building in the northwestern town of Nabire, deputy provincial police chief, Brigadier General Tony Yakobus, was quoted as saying.

Police could not immediately be reached for confirmation.

Fauzi, co-ordinator of the National Earthquake Centre, said earlier the quake measuring 6.9 on the Richter Scale killed eight and injured "hundreds". It struck at 6:05 am (2105 GMT Thursday) about seven kilometres (four miles) from Nabire.

Dr. Dodi Indrasanto, a senior official in the Department of Health, confirmed eight people died but said he did not know the number of injured.

The Meteorology and Geophysics Agency which runs the earthquake centre said Nabire's hospital was badly damaged and patients were transferred to a tent.

The quake, lasting between 10 and 30 seconds, also felled trees and damaged several houses and at least one bridge, it said in a statement.

Walls and roads cracked in the quake which was also felt in Manokwari, 120 kilometres northwest of Nabire.

Fauzi said the airstrip was cracked and it was not clear if planes could land.

"Our officials and those from the health department are ready to go but are waiting to find out whether that airfield can be used," he said in a radio interview.

Indrasanto said a five-member team from the Papua Health Agency had left the provincial capital Jayapura for Nabire in a small Cessna aircraft, which he expected could land even if the airstrip is damaged.

They would assess what type of help was needed.

Indonesia's easternmost province, Papua is mountainous or jungle-clad and sparsely populated. Roads are scarce and many areas can only be reached by air.

Officials in Nabire could not be reached by telephone but one local resident said the quake struck while his family of eight slept.

"We all ran behind the house because the land is quite expansive there," Muhammad Holil Az'ari, 25, a student, told AFP.

He said his house suffered only minor damage but a neighbouring home under construction was not as fortunate.

"It's totally destroyed," he said, before leaving to help his neighbours who were living inside the partially-built house but escaped safely.

He said he was too afraid to see how extensive the damage was elsewhere in town, but he heard that churches had been damaged.

"So far there have been nine relatively strong aftershocks that were felt in Nabire," Fauzi said.

France's earth sciences observatory in Strasbourg said it was the largest quake measured in the region since 2000.

The Indonesian archipelago is one of the world's most earthquake-prone regions. It sits on the "Pacific Rim of Fire" noted for its volcanic and seismic activity.

A quake measuring 6.8 on the Richter scale shook parts of the Maluku islands in eastern Indonesia on January 29 but there were no reports of major damage or casualties.

On January 2 parts of the holiday islands of Bali and Lombok were hit by a quake measuring 6.1, which damaged more than 6,000 buildings and caused financial losses of 12 million dollars.

TERRA.WIRE