The hospital in Herat has taken in more than 90 patients suffering from problems related to the winter weather, many of them shepherds. -- PHOTO: REUTERS

It is the coldest this impoverished, war-ravaged nation has been in at least a decade - that's as far back as Afghanistan's weather records go - and so far, the harsh weather has been blamed for more than 650 deaths.

The hospital in Herat has taken in more than 90 patients suffering from problems related to the winter weather, many of them shepherds. Several of the amputee patients were tending their sheep and goats when a blizzard shrouded the western province in blinding snow and left them stranded.

'I was surrounded by snow for two days, and I couldn't find my way back,' said Mr Ahmad Sadiq, 18, whose uncle died in the storm. One of his feet was amputated, and the doctors decided that the other will have to go, too.

'I don't want to live like this. I can't walk anymore. It's better to die than to live like this,' he said.

A spate of warmer weather in recent days has not slowed patient traffic at the hospital.

'The weather is much better now, but we are still very worried. More people are coming from remote areas because the road is now open,' said Dr Barakatullah Mohammadi, head of emergency room at Herat hospital.

Afghanistan is largely mountainous, and many people live in remote villages reachable only by foot. It is one of the poorest countries in the world, and most people live in mud and thatch homes heated by burning wood, coal or dung.

Temperatures this winter have plummeted to a low of minus 30 degrees Celsius. The more mountainous regions have seen up to 180 centimetres of snow, said Mr Abdul Qadir Qadir, head of the meteorology department.

Aid organisations and foreign troops have passed out several tonnes of clothing, blankets, food and fuel in provinces throughout the country and in remote, mountainous villages.

Among those hardest hit in Kabul are 70 displaced families recently relocated from the southern Helmand province, which was the front line of battles last year between international troops and insurgents.

Their camp lies on the outskirts of Kabul, where children walk barefoot in the freezing cold mud and snow. Many of the 'houses' are like that of 30-year-old Fatima and her family - a rectangular hole a few feet deep covered by a tarp.

'My children are all sick and are coughing throughout the night,' said Ms Fatima, who goes by only one name.

Along with the human lives the winter has claimed, more than 100,000 sheep and goats have died in the largely agricultural country, according to Mr Abdul Matin Edrak, head of the Afghanistan National Disaster Management Commission.

'All of my animals died. Both my legs were amputated,' Mr Ghulam Rasul, 35, said from his hospital bed, recovering from the operation. 'I was in the snow for two nights, then someone came and rescued me and took me home.' -- AP