At least two thousand people died and 1,200 are missing due to devastating floods in several coastal cities in northern Libya, one of the leaders of the country fractured between two parallel powers said Monday.
There are already dozens of confirmed deaths after the Mediterranean storm Daniel caused devastating floods that destroyed entire neighborhoods, but the health authorities’ report still did not include the city of Derna, the most affected and still without access to rescue teams.
The head of the parallel government in eastern Libya, Osama Hammad, defined the situation in Derna as “catastrophic” when referring to “thousands of people missing, entire neighborhoods devastated and swept away by the sea with their inhabitants.”
According to the Libyan National Meteorological Center, rainfall exceeded 400 milliliters per hour, a figure that had not been recorded for four decades. A member of Derna City Council, Ahmed Amdur, called for “urgent” international intervention to “save the city.”
The collapse of residential areas and public and private buildings and infrastructure caused road access to be blocked, which is why Amdur called for a maritime corridor to provide aid to the inhabitants of this coastal city located in the east of the country.
Abdulhamid Debiba, the prime minister of the Government of National Unity (GUN) based in Tripoli (west), promised that the State will compensate the populations affected by the floods and decreed three days of national mourning for the victims.
At the same time, he announced the sending of 50 ambulances and a team of 75 doctors and nurses to Derna, in addition to various materials intended to reinforce hospitals in rural areas.
The United Nations mission in Libya (Unsmil) stated in a statement that it is closely monitoring the emergency situation and expressed its “availability to provide support to those affected.”
After hitting Greece and Turkey in recent days, Cyclone Daniel became a subtropical storm on September 9 and is expected to begin weakening over Libya starting today as it heads toward neighboring Egypt, according to the weather center. Arab regional.
Source: TSF
