Port Moresby, May 24 (UNI) More than 100 people may have been killed in a landslide that hit a remote village in Papua New Guinea early Friday, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported, citing residents.
The landslide hit the remote village of Kaokalam in the Oceania country’s Enga Province, located approximately 600 kilometres (373 miles) from the capital here at about 3 am local time.
Houses were destroyed when the nearby mountainside collapsed, Elizabeth Larume, the president of the Porgera Women in Business Association, was cited as saying.
“It has occurred when people were still asleep in the early hours, and the entire village has gone down… From what I can presume, it’s about 100-plus people who are buried beneath the ground,” Larume was quoted as saying by the media.
The authorities have not yet published an official casualty figure.
Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape expressed his condolences to the families who lost their loved ones in the landslide, the report said.
