I can’t even begin to imagine 20,000 people dying so quickly like that. Absolutely horrible…
Damn, there seems to be no shortage of natural disasters this time of year
Oh hell this just gets worse and worse. I’m concerned for the survivors. 30,000 displaced. I really hope the two factions are able to work together:
The enormous task of providing immediate aid and then rebuilding Derna is complicated by the legacies of a decade of civil conflict, which has left two rival governments ruling eastern and western Libya.
Derna is controlled by the Libyan National Army, run by Field Marshal Khalifa Hifter and based in the eastern city of Tobruk. The rest of the country is run by the Government of National Unity based in the capital, Tripoli, in the west.
This split has hampered reconstructions efforts for years — though aid workers say both sides are now talking to each other.
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As rescuers in the devastated city of Derna searched underwater and under rubble, fears grew that rotting bodies could lead to a deadly outbreak of disease in the wake of this week’s floods.
A precise tally of the rising number of people killed is incredibly difficult given the level of destruction and chaotic political situation in the region, with bodies still washing up on the shore and burials being held in mass graves.
A deluge of rainfall from Mediterranean storm Daniel caused two dams to collapse, sending waves more than 20 feet high sweeping through the heart of Derna, a port city in the country’s east.
“They could have issued the warnings and the emergency management forces would have been able to carry out the evacuation of the people, and we could have avoided most of the human casualties,” Petteri Taalas, head of the World Meteorological Organization, told reporters in Geneva according to the AFP news agency.
The Tripoli Public Services Company began clearing away rubble in Derna’s previously densely populated center on Wednesday in an operation running 24 hours a day, the state-run Libyan News Agency reported.
The enormous task of providing immediate aid and then rebuilding Derna is complicated by the legacies of a decade of civil conflict, which has left two rival governments ruling eastern and western Libya.
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