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Philippines Scraps Mass Burial Plans for Flash Flood Victims
December 20, 2011

Philippine Navy personnel arranging coffins bound for flood-stricken areas in the country’s south on Tuesday. More than 950 deaths have been reported. AP Photo/Aaron Favila Philippine Navy personnel arranging coffins bound for flood-stricken areas in the country’s south on Tuesday. More than 950 deaths have been reported. AP Photo/Aaron Favila
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Cagayan de Oro, Philippines. Philippine President Benigno Aquino pledged aid on Tuesday to communities hit by flash floods that walloped the south as the official toll topped a thousand dead or missing.

Aquino flew to Mindanao island to inspect the ports of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan, choked with drying mud and crumpled homes as well as hundreds of decomposing corpses that have raised health concerns.

Mass burial plans for some of the dead that were announced on Monday were called off a day later, with officials saying each body would be fingerprinted and DNA samples taken from them first for future identification.

“I assure you the government will help you rebuild your homes. But in return, we expect you to refrain from moving back to those places that put your lives at constant risk,” Aquino said in a speech at an evacuation center.

The government said 957 people were dead and 49 others still missing after flash floods ravaged the two port cities as well as nearby areas overnight on Friday during the onslaught of Tropical Storm Washi.

Officials and experts said many of the dead were settlers living in shantytowns built on unstable river sand bars.

Aquino pledged to repair damaged roads and water systems and build mass housing units in safe relocation areas and water-level sensors for all major river basins across the country.

 

Agence France-Presse