December 19, 2011

Filipinos prepare mass graves for storm victims

By South East Asia correspondent Zoe Daniel, wires

Updated December 19, 2011 20:43:25
Authorities in the Philippines are preparing for mass burials to cope with the death and destruction caused by tropical storm Washi at the weekend.
The death toll stands at more than 650 with more than 900 still missing after flash flooding and landslides that swept away entire villages in the middle of the night.
The Red Cross says most of those killed were women and children.
Morgues and hospitals on the island of Mindanao are struggling to cope with the dead and injured in an area that is desperately poor and wracked by conflict.
Local authorities plan to bury unidentified bodies in mass graves to try to avert a disease outbreak and to reduce pressure on mortuaries which are now turning away the dead due to lack of space.
"Today we will dig a mass grave and bury the unclaimed bodies as well as those in an advanced state of decomposition," Iligan's mayor Lawrence Cruz said on national television.
He said up to 50 of about 300 bodies recovered in Iligan since Washi struck in the early hours of Saturday will be communally buried.
Television footage from an Iligan mortuary showed a corridor lined with bodies awaiting burial, wrapped in white plastic bags bound tightly with tan-coloured packaging tape.
Red Cross official Gwendolyn Pang says strict guidelines will be followed for any mass burials, including photographing corpses, listing identifying marks and laying them a metre apart for possible exhumation.
"I'm sure their families will look for them," she said.
About 50,000 people are in evacuation centres after their homes were literally washed away.
Aid agencies say they urgently need food, water, blankets, clothing, mosquito nets and lights.
President Benigno Aquino is set to visit the disaster zone on Tuesday after ordering a review of the country's disaster defences.
Australia's acting Prime Minister Wayne Swan and Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd have issued a statement saying Australia is deeply saddened by the loss of life.
They say Australian emergency relief supplies will be sent to flood-affected families as soon as possible.
ABC/AFP

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