24 dead, 8 missing in Sri Lanka mudslides, floods

Twenty-four people have been killed and eight others are missing due to floods and mudslides caused by incessant rain around Sri Lanka over the past week, officials said Sunday.

About 106,000 people have lost their homes or evacuated to safer locations, the Disaster management Center said.

The biggest damage was reported in southeastern Badulla district, where 14 people were killed by mudslides. Dozens of tea plantation workers were killed in the same district in October when mudslides buried their homes.

It is monsoon season in some parts of Sri Lanka, but many other areas not normally affected are also experiencing nonseasonal rains.

Officials have been forced to transfer inmates from a prison and patients from some hospitals in the country’s north-central region to other facilities due to flooding.

(AP)

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