JAKARTA, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- A 6.3 magnitude earthquake rocked eastern Indonesian province of Gorontalo in Sulawesi on Friday at 05:40 a.m. local time (2140 GMT on Thursday), the Meteorology and geophysics agency (BMG) was quoted by the national Antara News Agency as saying.

    The quake occurred at a depth of 95 kilometer with its epicenter located at 0.13 degrees southern latitude and 123.6 degrees eastern longitude.

    There was no immediate report on casualties, but the quake caused a number of people to run out of their homes in panic.

    Before that, three earthquakes measuring 7.7, 6.0, and 5.7 on the Richter scales consecutively struck the eastern provinces of North Sulawesi and Gorontalo in the early morning of Nov. 17.

    The Hong Kong Observatory reported earlier that the Sulawesi quake was 5.8 on the Richter scale.