Colombo, Nov. 28, (dpa/GNA) – At least 12 people have been killed due to flooding and landslides in the eastern and central parts of Sri Lanka after heavy rains drenched the country over the past three days, a top disaster official said on Thursday.
Four of the deaths were caused when a tractor carrying a group of students toppled and they were washed off in flood waters in Eravur, some 310 kilometres east of the capital, according to Director of the Disaster Management Centre Anoja Seneviratne.
The other deaths were caused in separate incidents due to landslides and persons being washed away in flood waters.
A depression in the south-west part of the Bay of Bengal has sparked heavy rains, while cyclone conditions were developing off the north-eastern coast of the country.
GNA