Floods overtake Sri Lanka, kills 150, govt seeks aid

The government of Sri Lanka is appealing for aid and other items like bottled water, new clothes and dry rations for those displaced after floods and mudslides damaged nearly 2,000 houses and killed no less than 151 people.

Rescuers continued to pull out more bodies under enormous mudslides on Sunday, and Health Minister Rajitha Senaratne said 111 people were still missing.

However, Major-General Sudantha Ranasinghe, who is heading the search and rescue mission, told newsmen that he does not expect to find any more survivors.

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“The situation is very dire,” Al Jazeera’s Minelle Fernandez, reporting from Matara in southern Sri Lanka, said. “The water levels are receding, but very slowly.”

“The sheer scale and number of landslides as well as flooding around the country have stretched authorities,” she said, adding that entire villages are still under water.

Reports say emergency teams rushed to distribute aid to another half a million people displaced by the island’s worst flooding in more than a decade.

 

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