UN calls for flood aid

THE United Nations is to seek international aid to help rehabilitate Bangladesh after devastating floods washed away rice crops, villages and livestock and killed more than 450 people in the impoverished nation.

Torrential monsoon rains and melting snow from the Himalayas have engulfed two-thirds of Bangladesh and large chunks of neighbouring India, and caused deaths in Pakistan and Nepal.

Landslides, house collapses, drowning, disease and bites from snake that slither through the floodwaters have brought the death toll across South Asia to 1,338 since mid-June, and it is expected to surpass last year’s figure of 1,500 for the annual rainy season.