Heavy rains have caused flooding and landslides in western Rwanda, killing at least 95 people, according to a top government official on Wednesday, while police seek others still stuck in their homes.
In video footage uploaded on Twitter by the state-run Rwanda Broadcasting Agency, muddy water poured quickly down an inundated road, destroying houses.
The governor of Rwanda's Western Province, François Habitegeko, stated their primary aim is to access every destroyed house to rescue trapped people.
He stated that some persons had been rescued and sent to the hospital, but he did not specify how many.
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According to François Habitegeko, the hardest-hit districts in his province were Rutsiro (26 dead), Nyabihu (19 dead), and Rubavu and Ngororero (18 each).
The rain began around 6 p.m. local time on Tuesday, according to Habitegeko, and the River Sebeya burst its banks. The earth was already saturated from the previous day's rain, which triggered landslides and forced the closure of roadways.
According to the Uganda Red Cross, six people perished in the night leading into Wednesday in the southwestern Kisoro district of neighbouring Uganda, near the border with Rwanda, when heavy rains hammered the mountainous terrain.
Five of the dead are from the same family, and the Red Cross said in a statement that excavations to recover the bodies had begun.
Since late March, Uganda has been experiencing heavy and prolonged rains, and landslides have been reported in other elevated places, such as Kasese near the Rwenzori mountains, where deluges and floods wrecked homes and displaced hundreds.
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