Rescue and emergency teams across Southeast Asia have been trying for days to deal with the aftermath of massive floods and landslides that have killed more than 1.500 people, while the scale of damage and aid needed has overwhelmed the capabilities of these groups, and citizens of the affected areas suspect corruption as the cause of the suffering.
Officials said 883 people died in Indonesia due to flooding, 486 in Sri Lanka, 185 in Thailand and three in Malaysia.
A large number of villages in Indonesia and Sri Lanka are impassable and buried in mud and rubble, while nearly 900 people are missing in both countries and thousands have been evacuated.
Many towns and villages have been cut off due to impassable roads, and a large number of power line poles have collapsed, leaving many places without electricity.
In Aceh Tamijang, the hardest-hit area in Aceh province, infrastructure is in ruins. Entire villages in the mountainous district are buried under thick mud. More than 260.000 residents have fled their homes on once lush farmland. For many, survival depends on the speed of aid, as drinking water, sanitation and shelter top the list of urgent priorities.
Trucks carrying humanitarian aid are slowly making their way along the road linking the city of Medan in North Sumatra to Aceh's Tamijang, which has reopened nearly a week after the disaster, but landslides are slowing distribution, said National Disaster Management Agency spokesman Abdul Muhari.
An Associated Press photographer captured the devastation in Aceh's Tamijang, where homes were badly damaged and animal carcasses lay among the rubble. Many residents are still haunted by the 2004 tsunami that devastated Aceh and killed an estimated 230.000 people worldwide, 160.000 of them in Aceh alone.
Residents mainly complain about the lack of drinking water, public kitchens, and clothing, while some claim that the extent of the flood consequences is a result of "too many corrupt officials."
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