Flash floods: at least 111 dead in the Horn of Africa

2023-11-16 16:59:00

The aid organization Save the Children announced this on Thursday. More than 770,000 people have already been displaced in the region in the northeast of the continent due to the extreme weather. Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia are particularly badly affected. Further heavy rain is forecast for the region.

According to the aid organization, heavy rains since October have led to widespread flooding in northern Kenya and the capital Nairobi, killing an estimated 46 people. In the Somali regional capital Beledweyne, in the center of the country, around 90 percent of the residents lost their homes due to floods. In total, at least 32 people were killed and almost half a million people were displaced in Somalia, most of them in the southwestern Bay Region. In neighboring Ethiopia, at least 33 people, including eight children, were killed by floods and landslides in the Gambella, Afar and Somali regions, according to Save the Children.

The floods are the latest in a series of extreme weather events in the Horn of Africa. At the same time, the region is experiencing one of the worst droughts in decades. Before the massive rainfall, there had been no rainfall for several consecutive periods. According to the UN, millions of people in the Horn of Africa are at risk of hunger. The crisis is also triggered by conflicts such as the recent power struggle in Sudan, the aftermath of the corona pandemic, the threat from Islamist terrorists and outbreaks of cholera and other diseases.