A series of earthquakes that hit the New Zealand city of Christchurch has confirmed fears that many homes will have to be abandoned, officials say.

Prime Minister John Key said Monday's tremors had hit the same parts of the city that were devastated by the 22 February, which killed 181 people.

Mr Key said he now had "a reasonably clear picture about what land won't be able to be rebuilt on".

He had earlier said 10,000 homes would be destroyed.

But the prime minister declined to specify which areas he was talking about, saying homeowners would be told when negotiations with insurers were completed.

"There are certainly in the order of thousands of homes that are affected," he said.

Christchurch is struggling to recover from the February quake. Recovery and reconstruction costs are expected to total at least NZ$15bn ($11bn; £7bn).

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