157 bodies recovered after landslides hit Ethiopia

No fewer than 157 bodies have been recovered from two villages in Ethiopia after landslides swept through the regions on different days.

The first landslide, triggered by heavy rains in a remote mountainous region of the Gofa zone, occurred on Sunday evening.

A second one engulfed locals, including police, who gathered to help the next morning.

Markos Melese, zonal head of the national disaster response agency in Gofa, told Reuters that a search is ongoing and “there are bodies that are yet to be recovered”.

The new toll triples the amount of bodies recovered on Monday.

Meskir Mitku, general administrator of the Gofa zone, said women and children were among the casualties.

Social media footage showed hundreds of people at the scene and others digging in the dirt for trapped persons.

Ethiopia’s southern region has been battered by seasonal rains between April and May that caused flooding and mass displacement, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

In May, OCHA said “floods impacted over 19,000 people in several zones, displacing over a thousand and causing damage to livelihoods and infrastructure”.

The southern region is also not new to landslides. In 2018, at least 32 people were killed after two separate incidents within a week of each other.

In May 2016, some 50 people were killed in floods and landslides following heavy rains.

The recent flooding and landslides occurred even as other parts of the country are facing severe drought.