PORT MORESBY, Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea reported on
Monday more than 2,000 people were buried in a massive
landslide.Villagers and rescuers continue to search through the rubble
A once-bustling remote
hillside village in the province of Enga was almost completely wiped out
when the landslide
struck in the early hours of Friday morning.
"The landslide buried
more than 2,000 people alive and caused major destruction to buildings, food
gardens and caused major impact on the economic lifeline of the country,"
the national disaster center said in a letter to the UN office in Port
Moresby.
Aid workers and villagers
continue to brave dangerous conditions while desperately searching for
survivors.
Australia's Deputy Prime
Minister, Richard Marles, announced that his country is planning to send
assistance.
"Our two countries are
very close together, and in moments of natural disaster, they have been quick
to support us. We are reciprocating the same kindness," Marles told
the Australian public broadcaster ABC on Monday.
"The situation is
terrible with the land still sliding. The water is running and this is creating
a massive risk for everyone involved," UN migration agency official Serhan
Aktoprak said on Sunday.
Relief agencies and local
leaders initially thought that between 100 and 300 people had died in the
disaster.
Authorities revised the death
toll upward when aid workers on the ground realized more people were living in
the village than initially thought.
The village was home to more
than 4,000 people and served as a trading post for alluvial miners who panned
for gold in the highlands.
The disaster has displaced
more than 1,000 people, and food gardens and water supplies have been nearly
wiped out.
On both sides of the massive
debris field, which covers an area the size of three to four football fields
and has cut off the main highway through the province, government authorities
set up evacuation centers on safer ground.
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