Rescue teams struggled amid devastation in eastern Libya, retrieving hundreds of bodies from the rubble in a coastal city that has been inundated by devastating floods, a humanitarian agency said Tuesday. Authorities estimated that as many as 2,000 people are believed dead in the city of Derna alone. Pics/AFP
Updated On: 2023-09-12 04:03 PM IST
Compiled by : Asif Ali Sayed
Tamer Ramadan, Libya envoy for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, said 10,000 people were missing after the unprecedented flooding
Speaking to reporters at UN briefing in Geneva via videoconference from Tunisia, he said the death toll was huge and expected to reach into the thousands in the coming days
Speaking about the fallout from Friday's devastating earthquake in Morocco, on the other side of North Africa, Ramadan said the situation in Libya was as devastating as the situation in Morocco
Ossama Hamad, prime minister of the government in eastern Libya, said that many of the missing were believed to have been carried away after two upstream dams burst. He said the devastation in Derna is far beyond the capabilities of his country
The Libyan Red Crescent said early Tuesday that its teams counted more than 300 people dead in Derna, which authorities have declared a disaster zone
