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Flooding killed at least 20 people and left more than 100 others missing in eastern Afghanistan's Nuristan province on Monday, officials said. Rescue teams are currently struggling to reach survivors who remain trapped under layers of mud, debris, and boulders.
In Parun, the provincial capital, only mud and dirt remained where riverside shops once stood, as residents searched through the debris for their missing mayor.
Several government employees, including the town's mayor, are among the missing, according to the provincial governor's office. Feraidon Samim, a spokesperson for the Nuristan governor, confirmed that emergency workers have recovered nine bodies so far.
On Tuesday, emergency workers faced difficulties using a single bulldozer to clear debris in Parun, where floodwaters had buried multiple shops and sent massive boulders crashing into nearby buildings.
Afghanistan is particularly vulnerable to climate change, which has driven an increase in severe flooding across the country, according to the head of Afghanistan's National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA).
Environmental issues have severely impacted the Afghan people and deepened the country's ongoing humanitarian crisis, Mawlavi Mati-ul-Haq Khalis, the director general of NEPA, stated earlier this month. The comment follows devastating seasonal weather patterns, including heavy rainfall and flooding that killed approximately 150 people in April and at least 24 more in May.
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