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The toll in deadly flooding and landslides across parts of Asia climbed past 1,160 on Monday as hardest-hit Sri Lanka and Indonesia deployed military personnel to help survivors.Separate weather systems brought torrential, extended rainfall to the island of Sri Lanka and large parts of Indonesia’s Sumatra, southern Thailand and northern Malaysia last week.Much of the region is currently in its monsoon season but climate change is producing more extreme rain events and turbocharging storms.The World Health Organization said it was deploying rapid response teams and critical supplies to the region.The UN agency’s chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told reporters in Geneva that it was “another reminder of how climate change is driving more frequent and more extreme weather events, with disastrous effects”.The relentless rains left residents clinging to rooftops awaiting rescue by boat or helicopter, and cut entire villages off from assistance.Arriving in North Sumatra on Monday, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto said “the worst has passed, hopefully”.The government’s “priority now is how to immediately send the necessary aid”, with particular focus on several cut-off areas, he added.Prabowo is under increasing pressure to declare a national emergency in response to flooding and landslides that have killed at least 593 people, with nearly 470 still missing.Unlike his Sri Lankan counterpart, Prabowo has also avoided publicly calling for international assistance.The toll is the deadliest in a natural disaster in Indonesia since a massive 2018 earthquake and subsequent tsunami killed more than 2,000 people in Sulawesi.The government has sent three warships carrying aid and two hospital ships to some of the worst-hit areas, where many roads remain impassable.In North Aceh, 28-year-old Misbahul Munir described walking through water that reached his neck to get back to his parents.”Everything in the house was destroyed because it was submerged,” he told AFP.”I have only the clothes I am wearing,” he said in tears.”In other places, there were a lot of people who died. We are grateful that we are healthy.”- ‘Everything went under’ -In Sri Lanka, the government called for international aid and used military helicopters to reach people stranded by flooding and landslides triggered by Cyclone Ditwah.At least 390 people have been killed, Sri Lankan officials said on Monday, with another 352 still missing.Floodwaters in the capital Colombo peaked overnight.Now that the rain has stopped, there were hopes that waters would begin receding. Some shops and offices have reopened.The floodwaters came as a surprise to some around Colombo.”Every year we experience minor floods, but this is something else,” delivery driver Dinusha Sanjaya, 37, told AFP.”It is not just the amount of water, but how quickly everything went under.”Officials said the extent of the damage in the worst-affected central region was only just being revealed as relief workers cleared roads blocked by fallen trees and mudslides.President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has declared a state of emergency to deal with what he called the “most challenging natural disaster in our history”.The Sri Lankan president received a phone call from India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday to assure him of New Delhi’s continued support for relief and recovery efforts, Indian officials said.The losses and damage are the worst in Sri Lanka since the devastating 2004 tsunami that killed around 31,000 people there and left more than a million homeless.- Anger in Thailand -By Sunday afternoon, rain had subsided across Sri Lanka but low-lying areas of the capital were flooded and authorities were bracing for a major relief operation.Military helicopters have been deployed to airlift stranded residents and to deliver food. One crashed just north of Colombo on Sunday, killing the pilot.The annual monsoon season often brings heavy rain, triggering landslides and flash floods.But the flooding that hit Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia was also exacerbated by a rare tropical storm that dumped heavy rain on Sumatra island in particular.The waves of rain caused flooding that killed at least 176 people in southern Thailand, authorities said Monday, one of the deadliest flood incidents in the country in a decade.The government has rolled out relief measures, but there has been growing public criticism of the flood response, and two local officials have been suspended over their alleged failures.Across the border in Malaysia, where heavy rains also inundated large stretches of land in Perlis state, two people were killed.burs-sah-abh/aj/ksb

The toll in deadly flooding and landslides across parts of Asia climbed past 1,100 on Monday as hardest-hit Sri Lanka and Indonesia deployed military personnel to help survivors.Separate weather systems brought torrential, extended rainfall to the entire island of Sri Lanka and large parts of Indonesia’s Sumatra, southern Thailand and northern Malaysia last week.Much of the region is currently in its monsoon season but climate change is producing more extreme rain events and turbocharging storms.The relentless rains left residents clinging to rooftops awaiting rescue by boat or helicopter, and cut entire villages off from assistance.Arriving in North Sumatra on Monday, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto said “the worst has passed, hopefully”.The government’s “priority now is how to immediately send the necessary aid”, with particular focus on several cut-off areas, he added.Prabowo is under increasing pressure to declare a national emergency in response to flooding and landslides that have killed at least 593 people, with nearly 470 still missing.Unlike his Sri Lankan counterpart, Prabowo has also avoided publicly calling for international assistance.The toll is the deadliest in a natural disaster in Indonesia since a massive 2018 earthquake and subsequent tsunami killed more than 2,000 people in Sulawesi.The government has sent three warships carrying aid and two hospital ships to some of the worst-hit areas, where many roads remain impassable.In North Aceh, 28-year-old Misbahul Munir described walking through water that reached his neck to get back to his parents.”Everything in the house was destroyed because it was submerged,” he told AFP.”I have only the clothes I am wearing,” he said in tears.”In other places, there were a lot of people who died. We are grateful that we are healthy.”- ‘Everything went under’ -In Sri Lanka, the government called for international aid and used military helicopters to reach people stranded by flooding and landslides triggered by Cyclone Ditwah.At least 355 people have been killed, Sri Lankan officials said on Monday, with another 366 still missing.Floodwaters in the capital Colombo peaked overnight.Now that the rain has stopped, there were hopes that waters would begin receding. Some shops and offices have reopened.The floodwaters came as a surprise to some around Colombo.”Every year we experience minor floods, but this is something else,” delivery driver Dinusha Sanjaya, 37, told AFP.”It is not just the amount of water, but how quickly everything went under.”Officials said the extent of the damage in the worst-affected central region was only just being revealed as relief workers cleared roads blocked by fallen trees and mudslides.President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who declared a state of emergency to deal with the disaster, called the flooding the “largest and most challenging natural disaster in our history.”The losses and damage are the worst in Sri Lanka since the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami that killed around 31,000 people there and left more than a million homeless.- Anger in Thailand -By Sunday afternoon, rain had subsided across Sri Lanka but low-lying areas of the capital were flooded and authorities were bracing for a major relief operation.Military helicopters have been deployed to airlift stranded residents and to deliver food. One crashed just north of Colombo on Sunday, killing the pilot.The annual monsoon season often brings heavy rain, triggering landslides and flash floods.But the flooding that hit Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia was also exacerbated by a rare tropical storm that dumped heavy rain on Sumatra island in particular.The waves of rain caused flooding that killed at least 176 people in southern Thailand, authorities said Monday, one of the deadliest flood incidents in the country in a decade.The government has rolled out relief measures, but there has been growing public criticism of the flood response, and two local officials have been suspended over their alleged failures.Across the border in Malaysia, where heavy rains also inundated large stretches of land in Perlis state, two people were killed.burs-sah-abh/ami/fox

A Bangladesh court sentenced Sheikh Rehana, sister of former premier Sheikh Hasina, to seven years in prison on Monday for corruption in a case involving the grabbing of lucrative plots in the capital.Rehana’s daughter Tulip Siddiq, who is a British lawmaker, was handed a two-year sentence in the same case, said Khan Mainul Hasan, prosecutor for the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC).Hasina, who was given the death penalty for crimes against humanity last month, and 14 other government officials were condemned to five years of imprisonment.The 78-year-old former premier has sought refuge in India since her ouster last year following a student-led uprising, but Rehana’s whereabouts remain unknown.Siddiq, who resigned as British anti-corruption minister in January after being named in graft probes in Bangladesh, called the trial “flawed and farcical from the beginning to the end”.Hasan said the commission had details of Siddiq’s correspondence with Salahuddin Ahmed, the principal secretary to the then prime minister, exposing her role in the case.”Tulip insisted that her aunt Sheikh Hasina allocate plots for her mother and siblings, as she herself took three — one for her and two for her children,” Hasan said.”She called him (Ahmed), communicated via some encrypted apps, and even met him while she was in Dhaka.”Judge Rabiul Alam quoted verses from the Quran as he read out the judgement.”The court has full authority to try any Bangladeshi, whether the person is in the country or abroad,” he said.Hasina decried the latest verdict in a statement to AFP on Monday.”No country is free from corruption. But corruption needs to be investigated in a way that is not itself corrupt. The ACC has failed that test today,” she said.The interim government in Bangladesh would formally notify British authorities about Siddiq’s verdict, prosecutors said.Siddiq, 43, said she refused to be “distracted by the dirty politics of Bangladesh”.”The outcome of this kangaroo court is as predictable as it is unjustified,” she said in a statement.”I hope this so-called ‘verdict’ will be treated with the contempt it deserves.”Bangladesh has been in political turmoil since the end of Hasina’s rule, and violence has marred campaigning for elections slated for February 2026.The United Nations says up to 1,400 people were killed in crackdowns as Hasina tried to cling to power.

The toll in deadly flooding and landslides across parts of Asia climbed past 1,000 on Monday as hardest-hit Sri Lanka and Indonesia deployed military personnel to help survivors.Separate weather systems brought torrential, extended rainfall to the entire island of Sri Lanka and large parts of Indonesia’s Sumatra, southern Thailand and northern Malaysia last week.Much of the region is currently in its monsoon season but climate change is producing more extreme rain events and turbocharging storms.The relentless rains left residents clinging to rooftops awaiting rescue by boat or helicopter, and cut entire villages off from assistance.Arriving in North Sumatra on Monday, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto said “the worst has passed, hopefully”.The government’s “priority now is how to immediately send the necessary aid”, with particular focus on several cut-off areas, he added.Prabowo has come under increasing pressure to declare a national emergency in response to flooding and landslides that have killed at least 502 people, with more than 500 still missing.Unlike his Sri Lankan counterpart, Prabowo has also avoided publicly calling for international assistance.The toll is the deadliest in a natural disaster in Indonesia since a massive 2018 earthquake and subsequent tsunami killed more than 2,000 people in Sulawesi.The government has sent three warships carrying aid and two hospital ships to some of the worst-hit areas, where many roads remain impassable.At an evacuation centre in North Aceh, 28-year-old Misbahul Munir described walking through water that reached his neck to get back to his parents.”Everything in the house was destroyed because it was submerged,” he told AFP.”I have only the clothes I am wearing,” he said in tears.”In other places, there were a lot of people who died. We are grateful that we are healthy.”- ‘Everything went under’ -In Sri Lanka, the government called for international aid and used military helicopters to reach people stranded by flooding and landslides triggered by Cyclone Ditwah.At least 355 people have been killed, Sri Lankan officials said on Monday, with another 366 still missing.Floodwaters in the capital Colombo peaked overnight.Now that the rain has stopped, there were hopes that waters would begin receding. Some shops and offices have reopened.The floodwaters came as a surprise to some around Colombo.”Every year we experience minor floods, but this is something else,” delivery driver Dinusha Sanjaya, 37, told AFP.”It is not just the amount of water, but how quickly everything went under.”Officials said the extent of the damage in the worst-affected central region was only just being revealed as relief workers cleared roads blocked by fallen trees and mudslides.President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who declared a state of emergency to deal with the disaster, called the flooding the “largest and most challenging natural disaster in our history.”The losses and damage are the worst in Sri Lanka since the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami that killed around 31,000 people there and left more than a million homeless.- Anger in Thailand -By Sunday afternoon, rain had subsided across Sri Lanka but low-lying areas of the capital were flooded and authorities were bracing for a major relief operation.Military helicopters have been deployed to airlift stranded residents and to deliver food. One crashed just north of Colombo on Sunday, killing the pilot.The annual monsoon season often brings heavy rain, triggering landslides and flash floods.But the flooding that hit Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia was also exacerbated by a rare tropical storm that dumped heavy rain on Sumatra island in particular.Climate change has also increased the intensity of storms, and produced more heavy rain events because a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture.The waves of rain caused flooding that killed at least 176 people in southern Thailand, authorities said Monday, one of the deadliest flood incidents in the country in a decade.The government has rolled out relief measures, but there has been growing public criticism of the flood response, and two local officials have been suspended over their alleged failures.Across the border in Malaysia, where heavy rains also inundated large stretches of land in Perlis state, two people were killed.burs-sah-abh/ami

For villages on the northern edge of Sri Lanka’s capital, floods are a familiar ordeal — but even the hardiest residents were stunned when the Kelani river surged this week.Heavy showers upstream inundated the banks of the Kelani on Friday night, and the situation deteriorated rapidly the next day even though Cyclone Ditwah — which brought the rains — had already moved on.Most residents along the banks of the major waterway in Kolonnawa ignored repeated flood warnings, thinking it wouldn’t be as bad as authorities were predicting.Climate change has increased the intensity of storms, and produced more heavy rain events because a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture.Delivery driver Dinusha Sanjaya said he brushed aside the warnings, assuming the worst would be a few feet of water. But within an hour, his two-storey house was submerged.”I never thought the floods would be this bad,” Sanjaya, 37, told AFP at Vidyawardana school where all his neighbours were also taking refuge on Monday.”Every year we experience minor floods, but this is something else. It is not just the amount of water, but how quickly everything went under.”Neighbour Fatima Rushna, 48, said she realised the house was flooding when water reached her bed shortly after midnight on Saturday. She rushed out with her husband, Mohamed Azmi, 50.”We had no time to collect any valuables. All we have are the clothes we are wearing,” she said while waiting for donations at the makeshift camp.- Livelihoods lost -For C. V. Ariyaratne, 70, and his wife Emalin, 65, evacuating in a hurry was particularly challenging as she suffers from scoliosis, is severely hunched and needs help to walk.”We have been through floods, but this is even worse than what we experienced in 2016,” Ariyaratne said, referring to the disaster nine years ago when 71 people were killed across the country.For seamstress Nirushika, 44, the floods have taken away her livelihood. “I earned a living by running a small sewing business,” she said. “Both my sewing machines were lost.”There was more havoc upstream.The mountainous central region was the worst-affected, with scores of people buried alive in mudslides triggered by record rain, in some places over 500 millimetres.- ‘Clean-up’ -Official data showed that 257 out of the 355 deaths so far were in the central hilly tea-growing region. Another 366 were still missing.President Anura Kumara Dissanayake has declared a state of emergency to deal with the disaster and vowed to “build back better” with international assistance.Residents at the Kolonnawa camp said the state had provided dry rations, which volunteers had cooked for them.Classrooms in the three-storey building had been turned into makeshift accommodation, occupied by about 300 people, including 80 children below the age of 12.As the situation elsewhere in the capital slowly returned to normal, residents were seen donating food and other essentials.Government figures show that nearly 210,000 people were in camps, while another 1.15 million needed some form of government assistance.The Irrigation Department said water levels in Colombo had peaked and that the floods should begin receding within a day.”Colombo floods are at their maximum now,” Irrigation Director L. S. Sooriyabandara said. “Flood levels elsewhere have gone down substantially.”Survivor G. Patrick, 60, said he was dreading returning home.”My mother, who is 80, is blind and I am not able to clean the house on my own,” Patrick told AFP. “For me, the biggest problem is getting help for the clean-up.”

Virat Kohli dispelled any doubts about his enduring quality with the 50-over World Cup on the horizon after a match-winning century for India against South Africa.The 37-year-old struck 135 off 120 balls — his 52nd one-day international hundred — to guide the hosts to a 17-run win in the opening match of the three-game series in Ranchi on Sunday.Kohli, who now plays only the 50-over format after retiring from Tests and T20s, starred alongside fellow veteran Rohit Sharma, 38.Their futures have been widely debated, with chief selector Ajit Agarkar recently noting that it was rare for players to remain dominant while featuring in just one format of the game.But Kohli’s latest knock — his 83rd international century across formats — silenced any immediate doubts about his longevity.The batsman is targeting the ODI World Cup in 2027.”I don’t see any reason to talk about his future,” batting coach Sitanshu Kotak said. “It’s just the way he’s batting, it’s just brilliant… The way he’s performing, the way he maintains his fitness, there are no questions about anything.”Kohli shared a 136-run stand for the second wicket with Rohit, who hit 57 for his 60th ODI half-century, as India piled up 349-8. Kohli looked in especially imperious touch, hitting 11 fours and seven sixes in a fluent display.Questions about a possible Test comeback resurfaced after India’s recent 2-0 series loss to South Africa, but Kohli reiterated his commitment to the ODI format.”Yes, that’s how it’s always going to be,” he said. “I’m just playing one form of the game.”With 554 international matches under his belt, Kohli, popularly known as ‘King Kohli’ for his prolific run-scoring, said experience and mental sharpness guided his preparation now. “You know, I’ve never been a big believer of a lot of preparation, if that makes sense,” he said.”All my cricket has been mental. As long as I feel mentally I can play the game, I work physically very hard every day of my life.”It’s got nothing to do with cricket anymore. It’s the way I live.”Senior cricket journalist Ayaz Memon said the performance was a statement of intent from India’s senior duo. “Rohit and Kohli have served notice again that their ambition of playing the 2027 ODI World Cup is not misplaced,” he said in a social media post.Former opener Virender Sehwag said: “Virat Kohli has once again shown that making runs for him is as easy as we make tea. “Kohli is not chasing records, records are chasing Kohli. His hunger and passion remain the same today. King stays king!”

The toll in deadly flooding and landslides across parts of Asia climbed past 1,000 on Monday as hardest-hit Sri Lanka and Indonesia deployed military personnel to help survivors.Separate weather systems brought torrential, extended rainfall to the entire island of Sri Lanka and large parts of Indonesia’s Sumatra, southern Thailand and northern Malaysia last week.The relentless rains left residents clinging to rooftops awaiting rescue by boat or helicopter, and cut entire villages off from assistance.Arriving in North Sumatra on Monday, Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto said “the worst has passed, hopefully”.The government’s “priority now is how to immediately send the necessary aid”, with particular focus on several cut-off areas, he added.Prabowo has come under increasing pressure to declare a national emergency in response to flooding and landslides that have killed at least 502 people, with more than 500 still missing.Unlike his Sri Lankan counterpart, he has also not publicly called for international assistance.The toll is the deadliest in a natural disaster in Indonesia since a massive 2018 earthquake and subsequent tsunami killed more than 2,000 people in Sulawesi.The government has sent three warships carrying aid and two hospital ships to some of the worst-hit areas, where many roads remain impassable.At an evacuation centre in North Aceh, 28-year-old Misbahul Munir described walking through water that reached his neck to get back to his parents.”Everything in the house was destroyed because it was submerged,” he told AFP.”I have only the clothes I am wearing,” he said, dissolving into tears.- Sri Lanka seeks aid -In Sri Lanka meanwhile, the government called for international aid and used military helicopters to reach people stranded by flooding and landslides triggered by Cyclone Ditwah.At least 340 people have been killed, Sri Lankan officials said on Monday, with many more still missing.Floodwaters in the capital Colombo peaked overnight, and with rain now stopped there were hopes that waters would begin receding.Some shops and offices began to reopen.Officials said the extent of the damage in the worst-affected central region was only just being revealed as relief workers cleared roads blocked by fallen trees and mudslides.In Ma Oya, just north of the capital, Hasitha Wijewardena said he was struggling to clean up after the floods.”The water has gone down, but the house is now full of mud,” he told local reporters, appealing for military help to clean up.President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who declared a state of emergency to deal with the disaster, vowed to build back.”We are facing the largest and most challenging natural disaster in our history,” he said in an address to the nation. “Certainly, we will build a better nation than what existed before.”The losses and damage are the worst in Sri Lanka since the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami that killed around 31,000 people there and left more than a million homeless.- Anger in Thailand -By Sunday afternoon, rain had subsided across Sri Lanka but low-lying areas of the capital were flooded and authorities were bracing for a major relief operation.Military helicopters have been deployed to airlift stranded residents, and deliver food, though one crashed just north of Colombo on Sunday evening.Much of Asia is in its annual monsoon season, which often brings heavy rain, triggering landslides and flash floods.But the flooding that hit Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia was also exacerbated by a rare tropical storm that dumped heavy rain on Sumatra island in particular.Climate change has also increased the intensity of storms, and produced more heavy rain events because a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture.The waves of rain caused flooding that killed at least 176 people in southern Thailand, authorities said Monday, one of the deadliest flood incidents in the country in a decade.The government has rolled out relief measures, but there has been growing public criticism of the flood response, and two local officials have been suspended over their alleged failures.Across the border in Malaysia, where heavy rains also inundated large stretches of land in Perlis state, two people were killed.burs-sah/mtp

Sri Lanka and Indonesia deployed military personnel on Monday to help victims of devastating flooding that has killed nearly 1,000 people across four countries in Asia in recent days.Separate weather systems brought torrential, extended rainfall to the entire island of Sri Lanka and large parts of Indonesia’s Sumatra, southern Thailand and northern Malaysia last week.Arriving in North Sumatra on Monday, Indonesia President Prabowo Subianto said “the worst has passed, hopefully”.The government’s “priority now is how to immediately send the necessary aid”, with particular focus on several isolated villages, he added.Prabowo has come under increasing pressure to declare a national emergency in response to flooding and landslides that have killed at least 442 people, with hundreds more missing.Unlike his Sri Lankan counterpart, he has also not publicly called for international assistance.The toll is the deadliest in a natural disaster in Indonesia since a massive 2018 earthquake and subsequent tsunami killed more than 2,000 people in Sulawesi.The government has sent three warships carrying aid and two hospital ships to some of the worst-hit areas, where many roads remain impassable.- Sri Lanka seeks aid -In Sri Lanka meanwhile, the government called for international aid and used military helicopters to reach people stranded by flooding and landslides triggered by Cyclone Ditwah.At least 340 people have been killed, Sri Lankan officials said on Monday, with many more still missing.Floodwaters in the capital Colombo peaked overnight, and with rain now stopped there were hopes that waters would begin receding.Some shops and offices began to reopen.Officials said the extent of the damage in the worst-affected central region was only just being revealed as relief workers cleared roads blocked by fallen trees and mudslides.In Ma Oya, just north of the capital, Hasitha Wijewardena said he was struggling to clean up after the floods.”The water has gone down, but the house is now full of mud,” he told local reporters, appealing for military help to clean up.President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who declared a state of emergency to deal with the disaster, vowed to build back.”We are facing the largest and most challenging natural disaster in our history,” he said in an address to the nation. “Certainly, we will build a better nation than what existed before.”The losses and damage are the worst in Sri Lanka since the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami that killed around 31,000 people there and left more than a million homeless.- Anger in Thailand -By Sunday afternoon, rain had subsided across Sri Lanka but low-lying areas of the capital were flooded and authorities were bracing for a major relief operation.Military helicopters have been deployed to airlift stranded residents, and deliver food, though one crashed just north of Colombo on Sunday evening.Selvi, 46, a resident of the Colombo suburb of Wennawatte, left her flooded home on Sunday, carrying four bags of clothes and valuables.”My house is completely flooded. I don’t know where to go, but I hope there is some safe shelter where I can take my family,” she told AFP.Much of Asia is in its annual monsoon season, which often brings heavy rain, triggering landslides and flash floods.But the flooding that hit Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia was also exacerbated by a rare tropical storm that dumped heavy rain on Sumatra island in particular.Climate change has also increased the intensity of storms, and produced more heavy rain events because a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture.The waves of rain caused flooding that killed at least 176 people in southern Thailand, authorities said Monday, one of the deadliest flood incidents in the country in a decade.The government has rolled out relief measures, but there has been growing public criticism of the flood response, and two local officials have been suspended over their alleged failures.Across the border in Malaysia, where heavy rains also inundated large stretches of land in Perlis state, two people were killed.burs-sah/mtp

The death toll from floods and landslides triggered by Cyclone Ditwah rose sharply to 334 on Sunday, Sri Lanka’s disaster agency said on Sunday, with many more still missing.It is the worst natural disaster to hit the island in two decades, and officials said the extent of damage in the worst-affected central region was only just being revealed as relief workers cleared roads blocked by fallen trees and mudslides.The Disaster Management Centre (DMC) said the death toll had risen to 334, up from 212 earlier on Sunday, with nearly 400 missing and more than 1.3 million people across the island affected by the record rains.President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who declared a state of emergency to deal with the disaster, vowed to build back with international support.”We are facing the largest and most challenging natural disaster in our history,” he said in an address to the nation. “Certainly, we will build a better nation than what existed before.”The losses and damage are the worst since the devastating 2004 Asian tsunami that killed around 31,000 people and left more than a million homeless.Rain had subsided across Sri Lanka but low-lying areas of the capital were flooded on Sunday and authorities were bracing for a major relief operation.A Bell 212 helicopter carrying food for patients stranded at a hospital just north of Colombo crashed into a river on Sunday evening. All five crew members were taken to a nearby hospital.Another helicopter sent from India rescued 24 people on Sunday, including a pregnant woman and a man in a wheelchair, marooned in the central town of Kotmale, about 90 kilometres (55 miles) northeast of Colombo, officials said.Pakistan was also sending rescue teams, the Sri Lankan Air Force said, while Japan will also send a team to assess Sri Lanka’s immediate needs and has pledged assistance.The air force said two infants and a 10-year-old child had also been rescued from a hospital in the northern town of Chilaw, which was submerged on Saturday.Authorities said flood levels in the capital would take at least a day to recede, while dry weather was also forecast. Cyclone Ditwah moved north towards India on Saturday.- ‘Completely flooded’ -Selvi, 46, a resident of the Colombo suburb of Wennawatte, left her flooded home on Sunday, carrying four bags of clothes and valuables.”My house is completely flooded. I don’t know where to go, but I hope there is some safe shelter where I can take my family,” she told AFP.Receding water levels in the town of Manampitiya, 250 kilometres (155 miles) northeast of Colombo, revealed massive destruction.”Manampitiya is a flood-prone town, but I have never seen such a volume of water,” said 72-year-old resident S. Sivanandan.He told the local News Centre portal that businesses and property had been extensively damaged. A car had flipped upside down in front of his shop, he said.A woman in central Wellawaya said she heard a loud noise and went outside to see boulders rolling down a mountainside before stopping near her home.”I saw trees falling and moving with the boulders. We are afraid to go back to our homes,” she told reporters after moving to a shelter on safer ground.- Deadliest in years -The National Blood Transfusion Service said supplies were short even though there have been relatively few injuries.The National Building Research Organisation, which monitors the stability of hills, said there was a high risk of further landslides because mountain slopes were still saturated with rainwater.The worst flooding since the turn of the century occurred in June 2003, when 254 people were killed.

US President Donald Trump said Sunday his administration intends to maintain a pause on asylum decisions for “a long time” after an Afghan national allegedly shot two National Guard members near the White House, killing one of them. When asked to specify how long it would last, Trump said he had “no time limit” in mind for the measure, which the Department of Homeland Security says is linked to a list of 19 countries already facing US travel restrictions. “We don’t want those people,” Trump continued. “You know why we don’t want them? Because many have been no good, and they shouldn’t be in our country.” The Trump administration issued the pause in the aftermath of the shooting in Washington on November 26, that left 20-year-old Sarah Beckstrom dead and another guardsman critically wounded.A 29-year-old Afghan national, Rahmanullah Lakanwal, has been arrested and charged with first degree murder in connection with the incident. Lakanwal had been part of a CIA-backed “partner force” fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, and entered the United States as part of a resettlement program following the American military withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021.Lakanwal had been granted asylum in April 2025, under the Trump administration, but officials have blamed what they called lax vetting by the government of Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden for his admission to US soil during the Afghan airlift.Trump wrote after the shooting he planned to “permanently pause migration from all Third World Countries to allow the US system to fully recover.” Asked which nationalities would be affected, the Department of Homeland Security pointed AFP to a list of 19 countries — including Afghanistan, Cuba, Haiti, Iran and Myanmar — which since June have all faced travel restrictions to the United States.