The death toll from devastating floods in Indonesia has jumped from 15 to at least 60, with hundreds of other people still missing, local officials said on Sunday.
“We have evacuated 60 bodies from Aceh Tamiyang district,” Ghufran Zainal Abidin, the local chairperson of the Prosperous Justice Party, said from the worst-affected area in Aceh province, on the northern tip of Sumatra island.
“The Aceh Tamiyang area is trapped by water and the only way we can go around is by boat,” said Abidin, who is helping to coordinate the flood relief effort.
Earlier, officials said hundreds of people had been reported missing in the district. The local capital Kuala Simpang is still cut off from rescue teams, Abidin said.
Heavy rains have unleashed floods across Indonesia’s Sumatra island, forcing thousands to flee their homes and take refuge in state-run camps.
The army and Indonesian Red Cross were rushing aid supplies to the area.
Floods have also struck neighbouring south Malaysia, where almost 90 000 people have been forced to evacuate their homes by torrential rain. Seven people have thus far been killed.
Elsewhere, at least two areas remained isolated in the Gayo Lues and East Aceh districts.
In hard-hit Langkat district, rescue workers struggled to reach those in need, with waters still nearly a metre high in some places.
In other locations, main roads connecting provinces of West Sumatra and Riau are cut off, Kompas daily reported Sunday.
Rampant illegal logging in Gunung Leuser National Park is one cause of the heavy flooding in North Sumatra and Aceh.
Illegal logging in the national park was also blamed for flash floods in North Sumatra in 2003, which killed hundreds of people.
Vice-President Jusuf Kalla has blamed destruction of the country’s forests for floods and landslides during the rainy season and droughts during the dry season, reported The Jakarta Post.
He promised the government would intensify efforts to replant forests, allocating four trillion rupiah ($440-million) annually beginning next year for the work.
Last June, floods and landslides triggered by heavy rains killed more than 200 people in South Sulawesi province. Separate floods killed more than 20 people and forced 40 000 people from their homes in Borneo in the same month. — AFP