Many feared dead after flood hits Afghan mountain region

KABUL, Afghanistan — Afghan officials said many people were feared dead and others were missing in a flash flood in a remote mountainous area near the capital.

Surobi district police chief Shaghasi Ahmadi said a flash flood Saturday morning in the mountainous region east of Kabul killed “tens of people,” and others were missing.

Ahmadi said an accurate death toll was not available because mud houses were washed away. He said the district’s main hospital was seriously damaged in the flood.

President Hamid Karzai said he was saddened to hear news of the flood.

Surobi has several rivers that run through it. Flash floods are common in the area.

Heavy rain also swept across neighboring Pakistan, pulling down more than 100 homes, caving in a factory wall and killing at least 14 people Saturday, officials said.

The rain caused about 120 houses to collapse in the northwest Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, killing at least eight people, said Latifur Rehman, a provincial disaster management spokesman.

In southwest Baluchistan province, heavy rain caused the wall of a factory to buckle in the town of Hub, killing six people, including four children, police officer Hidayat Baluch said.

Three people were injured, he said.