Quake shakes Bali climate conference

An earthquake rattled Indonesia’s resort island of Bali today where thousands of people were gathering for the UN climate change conference but there were no reports of damage or injuries.

The 5.4-magnitude tremor was centred 150 miles south-west of Bali and six miles beneath the ocean floor, the US Geological Survey said.

The quake could be felt in Bali, where more than 10,000 people are attending a two-week conference about global warming

The walls and floors of massive tents set up in a sprawling complex of five-star hotels shook for around 10 seconds, but officials said they did not have any reports of injuries or damage. The quake was not strong enough to trigger a tsunami warning.

Indonesia, the world’s largest archipelago, is prone to seismic upheavals due to its location on the Pacific “Ring of Fire,” an arc of volcanos and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin.

In December 2004, a massive earthquake struck off Sumatra , triggering a tsunami that killed more than 230,000 people in a dozen countries, including 160,000 people in Indonesia’s westernmost province of Aceh.