Ten thousand people were reported missing after unprecedented flooding in Libya, the Red Cross has said, as the extent of the damage to Derna, the port city where two dams burst over the weekend, became more clear.
Officials in eastern Libya however stated that more than 5,000 people have died in the devastating floods caused by Storm Daniel.
Tamer Ramadan, the Libya envoy for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, gave the figure at a UN briefing in Geneva on Tuesday, describing the death toll as “huge”.
Local media quoted Tariq al-Kharraz, a spokesman for the administration that controls the east of Libya, putting the number dead at more than 5,200 people. Othman Abdel Jalil, the administration’s health minister, said he expected that number to double. “The number of missing people is in the thousands, and the number of dead is expected to reach 10,000,” he told Al-Massar TV channel.
Entire neighbourhoods have been washed away in Derna. More than 700 bodies have piled up in the cemetery waiting to be identified.
“The situation in the city of Derna is becoming more tragic, and there are no final statistics on the number of victims,” Jalil said. “Many neighbourhoods were inaccessible.”
Hichem Chkiouat, the minister of civil aviation, said the situation in Derna was disastrous. “Bodies are lying everywhere – in the sea, in the valleys, under the buildings,” Chkiouat told Reuters by phone after a visit to the city. “I am not exaggerating when I say that 25% of the city has disappeared. Many, many buildings have collapsed.”
The final toll would be “really, really big”, he added.
The United Nations Refugee Agency in Libya has voiced its concern for thousands of people missing or dead as a result of the floods the country’s eastern region.
“Our thoughts are with the thousands of people affected by the recent storm in Libya,” said UNHCR in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.
It added that the UNHCR was transferring urgent relief items including blankets, hygiene kits, and solar lamps to support those affected.
