Three bewildered children sit on the roof of a mosque in Baghlan Province, northern Afghanistan, their eyes blinking away mud that covers their entire bodies.
Beside them, a rescuer lowers their baby brother, two-year-old Arian, to the rooftop, a sheet tied around his waist that was used to pull him from the raging floodwaters below.
“Let’s take off the rope from his body,” the rescuer says on the video. “Bring his mother to hold him in her arms and be warm.”
In the past few days, at least 300 people have been killed in flooding in 18 districts across at least three provinces in northern Afghanistan, according to the United Nations’ World Food Programme (WFP), with at least 200 injured.
Videos show raging torrents of mud washing away mud houses – and people, their limbs flailing, in the fast-moving brown current, as would-be rescuers watch from higher ground, beyond reach.
The rescued children, ages 3, 5 and 6, were among eight siblings who were at home with their parents in Folo, in the Bulka district of Baghlan, when the flooding hit.
Their uncle Barakatullah, son of Haji Wakil Besmillah, the local school headmaster, told CNN something ominous seemed to be brewing late last week when severe wind swept through the district and neighboring areas, enveloping everything in darkness.
“Visibility was so poor that we couldn’t even see each other,” he said.
Then the rain started falling gently during Friday prayers – an unusual event for locals, who say it doesn’t rain very often so high in the mountain region, home to around 10,000 people, he added.
As the rain got heavier, suddenly the situation “turned dire”.
“People fled to higher ground, seeking refuge in mountains and hills. Unfortunately, some individuals who were unable to leave their homes fell victim to the floodwaters,” he said.
Aerial photos show belongings piled in plastic bags on rooftops, among them the hooded figures of women forced to cover their entire bodies even in times of disaster.
“Women who were rescued are forced to wear mud-soaked garments, while even infants as young as 2 to 3 months old are clothed in similarly soiled attire,” Barakatullah said.
In Folo, more than 100 people are believed to have been killed, he said – mostly women and children.
Some burials began over the weekend, but many more are already believed to be buried deep beneath mud. (CNN)
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