The toll from deadly flash flooding that ripped through northern Afghanistan on Friday rose to 62 people, mainly women and children, an official said, in a country highly vulnerable to climate change.
A disaster management official in the northern province of Baghlan said heavy seasonal rains sparked the flooding, and residents were unprepared for the sudden rush of water.
“The number of dead in today’s flood in Baghlan province has risen to 62,” Hedayatullah Hamdard, the head of the provincial natural disaster management department.
The toll “will probably increase” he said, adding that light rain had continued into the night in multiple districts of the province.
Since mid-April, flash flooding and other floods have left about 100 people dead in 10 of Afghanistan’s provinces, with no region entirely spared, according to authorities.
Farmland has been swamped in a country where 80 percent of the more than 40 million people depend on agriculture to survive.
