Storm claims 1,000 lives in Haiti
Workers started digging a mass grave for the bodies of Haitian flood victims today after Tropical Storm Jeanne left up to 1,000 people dead.
It was another tragedy for the Caribbean country in a year marked by revolts, military interventions and deadly floods.
While some corpses would be buried en masse to prevent health risks, others were being claimed by families for burial in the countryside.
Hardest hit was the north-west port of Gonaives, where 500 bodies were retrieved, said Toussaint Kongo-Doudou, a spokesman for the UN peacekeeping mission in Haiti. Another 100 were killed elsewhere in the country, and there were reports that as many as 1,000 could have been killed.
Bloated corpses were piled at three fly-infested morgues in Gonaives, where the electricity was still off, temperatures reached into the 90s and water still lapped at the sides of wooden houses Tuesday, days after the passage of Jeanne.
“I lost my kids and there’s nothing I can do,” said Jean Estimable, whose two-year-old daughter was killed and another of his five children was missing, presumed dead.
Interim President Boniface Alexandre addressed the UN General Assembly in New York today, pleading for help from the international community.
“In the face of this tragedy … I appeal urgently for the solidarity of the international community so it may once again support the government in the framework of emergency assistance.”
Floods are particularly devastating in Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas, because it is almost completely deforested, leaving few roots to hold back rushing waters or mudslides. Most of the trees have been chopped down to make charcoal for cooking.
Many of the bodies stacked in Gonaives’ flood-damaged General Hospital were children.
Dieufort Deslorges, a spokesman for the government civil protection agency, said he expected the death toll to rise as more reports came in from outlying villages.
The storm came four months after devastating floods along the southern border of Haiti and neighbouring Dominican Republic. Some 1,700 bodies were recovered and 1,600 more were presumed dead.
