More than 300,000 people trapped in India’s worst floods in 50 years have been rescued, but nearly double that number remain stranded without food or water, officials said yesterday.
About 60 people have died and 3 million people have been affected since the Kosi River breached its banks earlier this month on the border with Nepal and changed course, swamping hundreds of villages in eastern Bihar state.
“Large-scale evacuation will continue till all the marooned people are rescued in the next three to four days,” disaster management official Prataya Amrit said.
PHOTO: EPA
The government said the situation was unlikely to return to normal for months and UNICEF voiced fears about illnesses breaking out at congested relief camps.
“We will have to provide food and shelter to the survivors until October as they will not be able to return home,” Bihar Disaster Management Minister Nitish Mishra said.
The government has set up more than 100 shelters, but officials said nearly 600,000 people were still waiting to be rescued.
The floods have caused extensive damage and disruption to roads, water and electricity supplies in the affected areas, UNICEF said.
“Essential commodities including food are now being transported by boat,” the UN body said in a statement.
Tens of thousands of people have been displaced in Nepal, where thousands of Indians seeking shelter from floods in Bihar have also migrated.
At least 15 people died and some were still missing after an army rescue boat carrying flood survivors capsized on Friday.
Soldiers were facing problems tracing possible survivors because of strong currents, disaster management official R.K Singh said.
A family trapped on a tractor for several days made desperate pleas to be rescued as flood waters rose steadily around them, the Indian Express newspaper reported.
“We have been stuck here for the past 10 days with no rescue team reaching here. Our food and water stocks have run out. Our mobiles [phones] are working, but they too will fail any moment,” Laxmi Singh told the newspaper by telephone.
Survivors at relief shelters said they were not getting anything to eat.
“We have absolutely nothing with us here. We left everything behind,” one woman at a crowded relief camp told NDTV news network.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has described the situation as a “national calamity” and announced a relief package of US$228 million and 125,000 tonnes of grain.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique