Three bodies retrieved from Papua New Guinea landslide, UN says

26/5/2024 14:31

        Emergency teams pulled three bodies from the rubble of Papua New Guinea's massive landslide, the U.N. said on Sunday, warning the death toll of five would likely rise in the disaster where hundreds are feared dead.
        
        Media in the Pacific nation north of Australia have said Friday's landslide buried more than 300 people and over 1,100 houses when it levelled Kaokalam village in Enga Province, about 600 km (370 miles) northwest of capital Port Moresby.
        
        More than six villages have been impacted by the landslide in the province's Mulitaka region, said Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. The U.N. migration agency IOM said more than 100 houses, an elementary school, small businesses and stalls, a guesthouse, and a petrol station were buried.
        
        The death toll stood at five as of Saturday night, IOM's chief of mission in Papua New Guinea, Serhan Aktoprak, said in a statement on Sunday, adding that the "number of injured and missing are still not known".
        
        The U.N.'s Papua New Guinea office said three bodies were retrieved from an area where 50 to 60 homes had been destroyed, while six people, including a child, were pulled from rubble alive.