The death toll from floods and landslides in Indonesia, Thailand and Sri Lanka rose to more than 700 on Sunday, local media and Reuters news agency reported. Aid workers are also still searching for hundreds of missing people in the affected areas. Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced.
The floods and landslides are the result of monsoon rains: seasonal periods of heavy rainfall, caused by changes in the prevailing wind direction. Indonesia and Sri Lanka were also hit by a cyclone.
Cyclone
In Sri Lanka, the death toll rose to at least 212 on Sunday afternoon, Reuters news agency reported, citing local authorities. In Thailand, the death toll stands at 140.
The Indonesian island of Sumatra has been hit the hardest: the Indonesian Disaster Management Agency reports that the death toll in the provinces of North Sumatra, West Sumatra and Aceh has risen to 442. 402 people are also still missing. According to the Reuters news agency, around 213,000 people have been displaced across Indonesia.
Communication with the area has now been restored. However, the natural disaster has made a number of main roads impassable. On Sunday afternoon, relief and rescue teams tried to deliver relief supplies in North Sumatra using helicopters.
It is remarkable that a cyclone passed by Indonesia, because cyclones do not usually occur around the equator.
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