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Hundreds of protesters rallied in Libya’s disaster-hit Derna recently accusing the authorities of neglect after a huge flash flood devastated the coastal city and swept thousands to their deaths
Hundreds of protesters rallied in Libya’s disaster-hit Derna recently accusing the authorities of neglect after a huge flash flood devastated the coastal city and swept thousands to their deaths. Demonstrators gathered outside the city’s grand mosque and chanted slogans against the parliament in east Libya and its leader Aguilah Saleh.
A statement read on behalf of the protesters urged a speedy investigation and legal action against those responsible for the disaster. They also demanded a United Nations office in Derna and the start of the city’s reconstruction, plus compensation for affected residents and a probe into the current city council and previous budgets.
On September 10, two dams in which cracks were reported as far back as 1998 burst after Storm Daniel hit eastern Libya, unleashing a devastating and deadly torrent that swept through Derna, a city of 100,000 people. The flash flood killed nearly 3,300 people and left thousands more missing.
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Tens of thousands of residents are homeless and badly need clean water, food and basic supplies amid a growing risk of cholera, diarrhoea, dehydration and malnutrition, UN agencies have warned. Libya’s disease control centre banned citizens in the disaster zone from drinking water from local mains, warning that it is polluted. Rescue teams from European and Arab countries kept up the grim search for bodies in the mud-caked wasteland of smashed buildings, crushed cars and uprooted trees. The UN experts have blamed the high death toll on climatic factors as the Mediterranean region has sweltered under an unusually hot summer, and on the legacy of Libya’s war.
