Powerful and long-lasting tremors in the early hours of January 23 in southern Kazakhstan sparked widespread alarm and prompted thousands to take to their cars and flee the country’s largest city, Almaty, for safety. The epicenter of the magnitude 7.1 earthquake was registered in a sparsely inhabited area of Xinjiang, a region in northwestern China, some 262 kilometers from Almaty. The AP cited Chinese officials as saying three people were killed. The impact was far feebler in Almaty, but still enough to cause minor damage to some buildings. People reported sensing tremors as far away as Astan…