The tremor, measuring 5.0 on the Richter scale, struck Baoshan prefecture, home to more than 2.3 million people, in Yunnan province early Tuesday, the Xinhua news agency reported.

The impact was particularly large in some suburban areas of Baoshan city, the center of the prefecture, according to Xinhua.

"Three were seriously injured, as the houses they were in collapsed, and they are now in hospital," said a Baoshan city official, who identified himself by his surname Yu.

Yu disputed Xinhua's figure of the number of casualties, saying only four others were slightly injured and received first aid on the spot.

Material destruction near the epicenter was considerable, with hundreds of collapsed buildings and thousands more damaged to varying degrees, Yu said.

Six schools sustained serious damage and had suspended classes, according to Yu.

Nearly 5,600 people had to be evacuated from their homes and were put up in make-shift shelters, he said.

Yunnan province, in a quake-prone part of China, experienced a tremor in August that left more than 125,000 homeless, killed four and injured nearly

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