Kenyan floods toll hits 23

2006-11-15 14:56

Nairobi - Floods in Kenya's northeastern and coastal areas had killed 23 people and displaced more than 80 000, said the Red Cross on Wednesday.

It also warned that heavy rains would take a toll on the flood-prone western region.

Linet Atieno, an information officer with the Kenyan Red Cross Society, said: "From our countrywide assessment, we know of 23 people dead at the coast, the refugee camps and other areas of north eastern province."

Government officials in the coastal province said thousands were fleeing the rising water for shelter in the hills of Kwale district.

Roads had been blocked and many students sitting national high school exams had been cut off from schools and examinations centres.

Rivers threaten to break banks

The Kenya Red Cross Society said: "The number of people displaced are 80 000 and thousands more are affected and at high risk countrywide.

"Flooding is also expected to occur in the traditional flood-prone areas of western Kenya, with rivers threatening to break their banks."

The UN refugee agency, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, said the flash floods had destroyed hundreds of homes and killed a pregnant woman and a child in the Dadaab refugee camps in northeastern Kenya.

Thousands of Somali refugees fleeing tension in their country had been pouring into the Dadaab camps in recent months.

Heavy rains had also been pounding the Horn of Africa beyond Kenya, bringing misery to parts of Somalia, Ethiopia, Sudan and Eritrea. Thousands had been driven from their homes in southern Somalia.

Sheikh Sharif Ahmed, one of the Somali Islamist leaders in control of much of the country's south, said: "We are asking the international community to help the affected people."

- Reuters