Hundreds dead in N Korea flooding, S Korea to send aid

14/08/2007

South Korea said Tuesday it was ready to send aid to North Korea after its impoverished neighbour reported hundreds dead or missing in floods and tens of thousands of homes destroyed.

Deputy Unification Minister Seo Sung-Woo said this year's flooding in the North seemed to have caused "more serious" human losses and property damage than last year.

"There has been no request yet from North Korea but we are now consulting with other government bodies on sending aid," he said.

Low-lying areas in the centre of the capital Pyongyang have been inundated and communications networks and subways badly damaged, Seo said, but added it would not affect an inter-Korean summit there on August 28-30.

Footage from state television showed flooded streets in Pyongyang. Soldiers and civilians were seen struggling to repair broken bridges and roads.

The North's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said earlier that downpours since August 7 had caused "huge human and material damage."

As of August 12 they had had left hundreds of people dead or missing and destroyed more than 30,000 houses for over 63,300 families, it said.

According to KCNA, at least 800 public buildings, more than 540 bridges and sections of railway have been destroyed, with tens of thousands of hectares of farmland "inundated, buried under silt and washed away."
People riding bicycles in the North Korean capital Pyongyang
©AFP/File

The southern provinces of Kangwon and North Hwanghae which border South Korea, and South Hamgyong in the east, were among the worst hit with thousands of families left homeless after their houses were flooded, it added.

"The material damage so far is estimated to be very big. This unceasing heavy rain destroyed the nation's major railways, roads and bridges, suspended power supply and cut off the communications network."

North Korea was pelted by between 30 and 67 centimetres (about one to two feet) of rain between August 7 and 12, the agency said.

Good Friends, a South Korean agency specialising in aid to the hardline communist state, called for a speedy relief operation.

"A swift relief operation is needed to help North Korea, which has been hit by severe floods," Good Friends' Erica Kang told AFP.

"North Korea's rice belt along the west coast has been battered by torrential rain, prompting concerns that the country's food shortages will be more serious," she said, urging the North to seek international help and release more specific data.

The reclusive state suffered famine in the mid- to late 1990s which killed hundreds of thousands. It still faces persistent food shortages despite aid from South Korea and the UN's World Food Programme.

The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said its staff are on 24-hour alert to monitor the damage.

"Intermittent rain which started 5 August has caused serious flooding in many parts of the country, compounding the difficulties normally anticipated in the annual rainy season of July and August," it said in a bulletin Sunday.

In Pyongyang the water level in the Taedong River has risen to serious levels, the IFRC said.

North Korea frequently reports severe damage during Korea's rainy season. Experts say decades of reckless deforestation, to provide fuel or to clear hillsides for planting, have stripped it of tree cover that provides natural protection from flooding.

Last year the IFRC said a storm which hit in late October left 7,300 people homeless and injured 14. In July 2006 monsoon rains swept through much of the North, causing heavy human losses and property damage.

The federation said then that at least 100 people were dead or missing and more than 11,500 homes damaged or destroyed.

Created by admin

Time to read: 8.9 min