Two million displaced by India floods

 GUWAHATI: Floods in northeastern India have forced two million to flee their homes and 18 people have been killed, the disaster management agency in Assam state said on Wednesday.

“The total number of people displaced has gone up to two million and 18 people are dead so far in the third wave of flooding,” the disaster management department said in its latest bulletin.
At least 19 of oil-rich Assam’s 27 districts have been hit by floods over the past week and fresh rainfalls have been hampering a military-backed relief operation, according to officials.
“Rains and strong river currents are hampering relief and rescue operations by soldiers and Indian Air Force helicopters,” defence ministry spokesman S.S.
Phogat said in Guwahati, Assam’s largest city.
He said despite bad weather heavy-lift helicopters were carrying out between eight and 10 sorties a day, dropping up to 1.5 tonnes of food, medicine and relief materials during each trip.
Phogat said he was unable to put a figure on the number of people rescued so far from flooded homes.
“Our priority right now is to rescue trapped people and reach food and medicines to those affected,” he told AFP.
Some residents from flooded Majuli, a densely populated river island about 350 kilometres from Guwahati, complained of food shortages as well as a lack of government support.
“We have not got any relief supplies from the government and are almost starving,” said Rupamoni Payeng, a mother of three children.
“Some food packets were dropped by helicopters, but there was a mad scramble and only a few managed to collect,” she added. - AFP

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Floods leave 65 dead, 125,000 homeless in Niger

NIAMEY: Heavy flooding in Niger over the past few weeks has killed up to 65 people and left 125,000 homeless.
After appeals from the country's president for international aid, the first supplies, donated by Ireland to Plan International, have now arrived.
The southern Dosso region has been worst affected, with over 10,000 homes destroyed according to the UN.
The capital Niamey was also hit when the River Niger burst its banks, flooding the city's suburbs.
Plan International's Niger director Rheal Drisdalle said on 18-19 August, the river reached levels "not seen since the 1920s".
"As the river has not been this high for a very, very long time, people had built their houses near to the river - and then all the rice paddies along the river have been flooded," he told the BBC.
At last count, the United Nations' Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said that the floods have destroyed 14,000 homes and 7,000 fields of cereal crops across the country.
The West African country is already suffering from severe food shortages caused by recent drought.
President Mahamadou Issou pledged 1,400 tonnes of food and £712,443 in aid for people affected by the flooding, but admitted that it would not be enough and called for international help.
The first international aid - 35 tonnes of supplies on a plane chartered by Ireland - arrived on Sunday.
Drisdalle said the United Nations and other aid agencies were trying to raise funds to send further supplies.
Other West African countries have also experienced higher than average rainfall and flooding this season, including Sierra Leone, Burkina Faso and Ghana.
ONLINE

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