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ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (AP) — Ethiopian lawmakers declared three days of mourning Friday as excavators continued to search for bodies of victims of mudslides in remote parts of the East African country.
Heavy rains triggered deadly landslides in southern Ethiopia on Sunday and Monday, killing at least 257 people, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). The death toll could rise to 500, the office said in an update, citing local officials.
“More than 15,000 affected people need to be evacuated from the area,” OCHA said.
The National Assembly said three days of national mourning would begin on Saturday. Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed said earlier this week he was “deeply saddened by this tragic loss.”
Rescuers searched steep terrain for survivors of the previous day’s mudslide on Monday, leaving many buried in the Gofa district of Kenchoshacha Gozdi county.
Photos from the scene showed residents standing over the bodies of landslide victims as they were pulled out of the mud one by one. Excavators dug through the dirt with hand shovels.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on social media platform X that UN agencies are delivering food and other critical supplies to help those affected.
Ethiopia’s rainy season begins in July and is expected to last until mid-September, during which time landslides are common.
Deadly mudslides occur regularly across a large swath of East Africa, from the mountains of eastern Uganda to the central highlands of Kenya. In April, flash floods and landslides in Kenya’s Rift Valley region destroyed homes and cut off a main road, killing at least 45 people.
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