Over 100 missing after deadly floods sweep Afghanistan's Nuristan

More than 100 people are missing after deadly flooding hit Afghanistan's Nuristan province, disaster officials and the governor's office said.

Twenty bodies have been recovered and more than 80 people injured, Afghanistan's disaster agency ANDMA said on Monday.

The casualties were reported in the provincial capital Parun and other areas of Nuristan, which borders Pakistan, ANDMA said on X.

ANDMA spokesperson Yusuf Hammad said search-and-rescue operations are ongoing, with emergency teams deployed to the affected area. He warned that the death toll is expected to rise as rescue efforts continue.

In Parun, the mayor and government employees were among the missing, the governor's office said.

"Nine dead bodies are recovered," said Feraidon Samim, spokesman for the Nuristan governor.

Both he and the disaster agency said more than 100 remained missing.

AFP journalists who visited the remote northeastern area last month said a market, shops and other buildings were located near the riverside in Parun.

Ashiqullah Safi, head of Shpoul, an NGO in the town, told AFP the flood had "completely destroyed the municipality" as well as hotels and dozens of shops.

Residents were searching the area without equipment, he said, after floodwaters left big boulders in the town.

The head of Afghanistan's environmental protection agency, Mawlavi Mati-ul-Haq Khalis, this month said flooding in the country had increased.

Environmental problems "have severely affected the Afghan people and have contributed to a humanitarian crisis in the country", he said.

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Source: TRT