Beijing: The death toll in a landslide that hit a village in southwest China’s Yunnan Province rose to 46 after the body of the last missing person was retrieved from the mud-inundated debris on Saturday morning.
Around 1000 rescuers in orange jumpsuits, using construction machinery, retrieved the victims after digging for nearly 24 hours through a massive piles of mud and earth. The landslide hit the Zhaojiagou area of Gaopo Village around 8 am, yesterday. Forty-six residents — 27 adults and 19 children — were buried in the rock and mud debris. Two other injured people were sent to a nearby hospital, and it has been confirmed that their injuries are not life-threatening, state-run Xinhua reported.
Chinese leaders Xi Jinping, Wen Jiabao and Li Keqiang have ordered all-out efforts to rescue victims of the landslide in order to minimize casualties from the disaster.
Xi, general secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China, said efforts must be made to resettle affected residents, prevent secondary disasters and successfully complete relief work so as to ensure stability, the agency report said. (PTI)