101 dead in Cairo rockslide

2008-09-19 20:32

Cairo - The death toll from a rockslide in Cairo earlier this month has risen to 101 after rescuers pulled five more bodies from the rubble, local media reported on Friday.

Rescuers have started to break a rock exceeding 1 000 tons to free 17 victims of one house crushed under it, Egyptian daily al-Masri al-Youm reported.

The rockslide, in which several massive boulders separated from a cliff face on September 6 and crashed down on houses in a shanty town on the edge of the Egyptian capital, has prompted criticism of the Egyptian government for being too slow to respond.

At least two months will be needed to retrieve all the trapped bodies from under the debris, the paper quoted an Egyptian official as saying.

A geology committee has inspected the area and warned that a similar catastrophe could happen again, the paper said.

At least 1.3 million people live in the shanty town, known as Manshiet Nasser, mostly in extreme poverty. Infrastructure and services are minimal, as housing there was developed informally when rural dwellers moved to the city over several decades.

In 1994, 30 people were killed in a similar accident in the Manshiet Nasser area. - Sapa-dpa

- SAPA