Death Toll in Nepal Flooding and Landslides Reaches at Least 100, with Dozens Still Missing

Residents clean mud outside their houses in a flood-affected area following heavy monsoon rains in Kathmandu on September 29, 2024. (AFP)
Residents clean mud outside their houses in a flood-affected area following heavy monsoon rains in Kathmandu on September 29, 2024. (AFP)
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Death Toll in Nepal Flooding and Landslides Reaches at Least 100, with Dozens Still Missing

Residents clean mud outside their houses in a flood-affected area following heavy monsoon rains in Kathmandu on September 29, 2024. (AFP)
Residents clean mud outside their houses in a flood-affected area following heavy monsoon rains in Kathmandu on September 29, 2024. (AFP)

The death toll from flooding and landslides in Nepal has reached at least 100, with dozens of people still missing.

Police on Sunday morning warned the death toll was expected to rise further as reports come in from villages across the mountainous country.

The weather in Nepal was improved on Sunday and rescue, recovery and clean-up efforts were underway.

Rescuer workers recovered 14 bodies overnight from two buses headed to Kathmandu that were buried in a landslide on a highway near the capital city.

At least one other bus and other vehicles were still buried at the same spot, and rescue workers were digging through rocks and mud trying to find people.

Kathmandu remained cut off Sunday as the main highways out of the city were blocked by landslides. Three highways, including the key Prithvi highway that connects Kathmandu to the rest of the country, have been blocked by landslides.

Residents in the southern part of Kathmandu, which was inundated by water, were cleaning up their houses as water levels began to recede.

At least 34 people were killed in Kathmandu, which was the hardest hit by Saturday’s flooding.

Police officers and soldiers were assisting with rescue efforts, while heavy equipment was used to clear the landslides from the roads.

The government announced it was closing schools and colleges across Nepal for the next three days.

The heavy rains, which started on Friday, slowed on Saturday night, but were expected to continue through the weekend.

Last week, the government issued flood warnings across the Himalayan nation warning of massive rainfall. Buses were banned from traveling at night on highways and people were discouraged from driving cars.



Trump Escalates Harsh Rhetoric against Immigrants, Harris

Republican presidential candidate, former US President Donald Trump, watches the Alabama Crimson Tide versus Georgia Bulldogs college football game with musician Kid Rock and Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) at Bryant-Denny Stadium on September 28, 2024 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Getty Images via AFP)
Republican presidential candidate, former US President Donald Trump, watches the Alabama Crimson Tide versus Georgia Bulldogs college football game with musician Kid Rock and Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) at Bryant-Denny Stadium on September 28, 2024 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Getty Images via AFP)
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Trump Escalates Harsh Rhetoric against Immigrants, Harris

Republican presidential candidate, former US President Donald Trump, watches the Alabama Crimson Tide versus Georgia Bulldogs college football game with musician Kid Rock and Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) at Bryant-Denny Stadium on September 28, 2024 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Getty Images via AFP)
Republican presidential candidate, former US President Donald Trump, watches the Alabama Crimson Tide versus Georgia Bulldogs college football game with musician Kid Rock and Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) at Bryant-Denny Stadium on September 28, 2024 in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. (Getty Images via AFP)

Donald Trump on Saturday deployed some of his harshest rhetoric against immigrants who have crossed the border illegally and committed crimes, especially against young women, while he also escalated his personal insults against Kamala Harris.

In the battleground state of Wisconsin, Trump called Democratic Vice President Harris, who on Friday visited the US-Mexico border for the first time in her 2024 presidential campaign, "mentally impaired" and "mentally disabled".

The Republican presidential candidate was flanked by posters of immigrants in the US illegally who have been arrested for murder and other violent crimes, and banners saying "End Migrant Crime" and "Deport Illegals Now."

His speech was unusually devoted almost entirely to undocumented immigrants. He called those who had committed violent crime "monsters,stone-cold killers" and "vile animals".

Trump is locked in a close race with Harris ahead of the Nov. 5 election. Immigration and the southern border are one of the top issues for voters, according to opinion polls.

Sarafina Chitika, a Harris spokesperson, said after Trump's speech: "He's got nothing 'inspiring' to offer the American people, just darkness."

The former president blamed Harris and Democratic President Joe Biden for allowing undocumented immigrants into the US, accusing some migrants of wanting to "rape, pillage, thieve, plunder and kill the people of the United States of America."

At one point Trump admitted: "This is a dark speech".

Trump's speech was in the small Wisconsin city of Prairie du Chien, where a Venezuelan in the US illegally was detained in September for allegedly sexually assaulting a woman and attacking her daughter.

Some 7 million migrants have been arrested crossing the US-Mexico border illegally during Biden's administration, according to government data, a record high number that has fueled criticism of Harris and Biden from Trump and fellow Republicans.

In her visit to the border on Friday, Harris outlined her plans to fix "our broken immigration system" while accusing Trump of "fanning the flames of fear and division" over the impact of immigrants on American life.

Harris also called for tighter asylum restrictions and vowed to make a "top priority" of stopping fentanyl from entering the US.

Trump also repeated his false claim that his 2020 election defeat to Biden was fraudulent. If reelected, and "if allowed", Trump said he would prosecute people he blames for his loss then.

Studies generally find there is no evidence immigrants commit crimes at a higher rate than native-born Americans and critics say Trump's rhetoric reinforces racist tropes.

Trump typically focuses on young women allegedly killed by Hispanic assailants to drive home that message, eschewing cases that involve male victims.

Trump's opponents accuse him of cynically exploiting grieving families to fuel his narrative that foreign-born, often Hispanic, arrivals are part of an invading army.

But some of the families of the victims have welcomed Trump's focus on the issue of violent crime and the death toll of teenagers caused by the opioid drug fentanyl, much of which crosses into the US over the southern border.

Several parents who had lost children to attacks by immigrants in the US illegally, or to fentanyl, spoke in support of him before Trump's remarks on Saturday.