An earthquake off the southern Japanese coast on Monday led to a fatal house fire in Taiwan that killed one and caused Japanese officials to order evacuations.
Initially the quake sparked fears of a tsunami, but advisories were lifted after an hour.
In Taipei, Taiwan, the earthquake shook buildings and exploded a transformer box. According to Taiwan's fire and rescue agency, that explosion sparked a house fire that killed one person.
Taiwan's official Central News Agency gave the age of the deceased as 84, but offered no other details. One other person was injured in the fire, the government said.
Footage from Taiwanese television broadcaster TBS showed signs and lights swinging from the ceiling of a newsroom in Taipei. Fire crews sealed off a multi-level parking lot in central Taipei after the mechanical parking tower failed, damaging 11 cars.
The Japan Meteorological Agency said the magnitude-6.8 quake's epicenter was at a shallow point in seas east of Taiwan and south of Okinawa, near the Yonaguni islands. It said no tsunami was detected.
Television footage of the area showed calm seas, but as a precaution schoolchildren in some low-lying parts of islands in the region were evacuated to safer locations.
Japan reacts intensely to tsunami risks following the massive destruction caused by a March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that killed more than 18,500 people.
Taiwan's worst earthquake was a magnitude-7.3 temblor that struck the center of the island in September 1999, killing 2,415 people.
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