A boy who was trapped in an Afghanistan well for four days has died.

Rescuers had managed to pull out the six-year-old boy named Haider on Friday afternoon after working round the clock to rescue him.

But a local journalist told the BBC that the boy was unresponsive and not breathing when he was pulled out of the well in the southern Zabul province.

Rescuers had reported that there had been no sound coming out of the well since Thursday.

The rescue team had dug a trench into the ground to reach the boy. He was meant to be flown via helicopter to a hospital in Kabul for urgent medical treatment.

“In the first minutes after the rescue operation was completed he was breathing, and the medical team gave him oxygen,” Zabul police spokesman Zabiullah Jawhar told AFP. “When the medical team tried to carry him to the helicopter, he lost his life.”

“With great sorrow, young Haidar is separated from us forever,” Taliban interior ministry senior adviser Anas Haqqani tweeted shortly after.

Haider had been trapped in the well in the village of Shokak after falling off a road on Tuesday, an official from Zabul’s information and culture department told BBC Pashto.

The boy became wedged about 10m (33ft) down the shaft, which is thought to be around 25m (33ft) deep, AFP reported.

Video of the child showed him stuck inside the well but able to move his arms and upper body.

“Are you okay my son?” his father was heard saying in the footage. “Talk with me and don’t cry, we are working to get you out.”

“Okay, I’ll keep talking,” the boy had replied.

However, the boy’s condition reportedly deteriorated since being trapped.

The operation comes less than two weeks after a boy died in Morocco after getting trapped in a well for four days.