Libyan flood survivors face landmine risks
STORY: Survivors whose houses were swept away by the devastating flood in Libya’s city Derna have a hard choice to make.
Stay despite a lack of fresh water or flee through areas where landmines have been displaced by the torrents.
This Derna resident Hamad Awad sat on a blanket on an empty street with a bottle of water and bedding alongside him.
He said he is staying to clean up the area.
Another resident Wasfi said people were at a loss over what to do next.
Thousands of people are feared to have died after two dams above Derna broke on Sept. 10, obliterating residential blocks while people slept.
Many bodies were washed out to sea and more than 1,000 have already been buried in mass graves, according to the United Nations.
A week on, Libyan rescue volunteers confront the devastation, describing the scene as "tragic".
Entire districts of Derna, with an estimated population of at least 120,000, were swept away or buried in mud.
State media said on Sunday at least 891 buildings had been destroyed in the city, whose mayor has said 20,000 people may have died.
On Saturday, the UN Libya envoy visited the flood-stricken Derna, where he checked up on field operations and met the head of the eastern-based administration.
A report by the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said Libyan authorities had detected at least 55 children poisoned from drinking polluted water in Derna, where the homeless were surviving in makeshift shelters, schools or packed into the houses of relatives or friends.
It said floodwaters had shifted landmines and other ordnance left over from years of conflict… posing an extra risk to the thousands of displaced people on the move.
