Earthquake death toll at 1,644 as more bodies are recovered from the rubble

Myanmar’s ruling military said Saturday on state television that the confirmed death toll from a devastating magnitude 7.7 earthquake rose to 1,644, as more bodies were pulled from the rubble of scores of buildings that collapsed when it struck near the country’s second-largest city.

The new total is a sharp rise compared with the 1,002 total announced just hours earlier, underlining the difficulty of confirming casualties over a widespread region and the likelihood that the numbers would continue to grow from Friday’s quake.