The toll in deadly flooding and landslides across parts of Asia climbed past 1,000 on Monday as hardest-hit Sri Lanka and Indonesia deployed military personnel to help survivors.
Separate weather systems brought torrential, extended rainfall to the entire island of Sri Lanka and large parts of Indonesia’s Sumatra, southern Thailand and northern Malaysia last week.
The relentless rains left residents clinging to rooftops awaiting rescue by boat or helicopter, and cut entire villages off from assistance.
Arriving in North Sumatra on Monday, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto said “the worst has passed, hopefully.”
The government’s “priority now is how to immediately send the necessary aid,” with particular focus on several cut-off areas, he added.
Prabowo has come under increasing pressure to declare a national emergency in response to flooding and landslides that have killed at least 502 people, with more than 500 still missing.
The toll is the deadliest in a natural disaster in Indonesia since a massive 2018 earthquake and subsequent tsunami killed more than 2,000 people in Sulawesi.
The government has sent three warships carrying aid and two hospital ships to some of the worst-hit areas, where many roads remain impassable.
In Sri Lanka meanwhile, the government called for international aid and used military helicopters to reach people stranded by flooding and landslides triggered by Cyclone Ditwah.
At least 340 people have been killed, Sri Lankan officials said on Monday, with many more still missing.
The losses and damage are the worst in Sri Lanka since the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami that killed around 31,000 people there and left more than a million homeless.
