Haiti Buries Flood Victims In Mass Graves, U.N. Appeals For Urgent Aid

GONAIVES, Haiti (AFP) - Haitian authorities began burying flood victims in mass graves amid concern the putrefying bodies could pose a health hazard in affected areas where as many as 1,700 are feared dead.
"Because of the situation of the bodies, we have decided to bury the dead in mass graves," said Interior Minister Herard Abraham.
Officials said the burials started Wednesday in the northern city of Gonaives, which had 600 of the 711 confirmed deaths, and where morgues had no electricity for refrigeration, leaving bodies to rot in the sweltering heat.
"As waters go down, we are finding more bodies," said Toussaint Kongo-Doudou, the spokesman of the UN peacekeepers in Haiti.
Because morgues are full and in some cases difficult to reach, "people are starting to dump bodies in front of the UN compound," he said.
The stench was almost unbearable in this city of 100,000, where carcasses of goats and cows littered the ground and open sewers spewed into the streets.
Authorities said they feared the confirmed death would rise dramatically. Prime Minister Gerard Latortue said that in Gonaives alone, 1,000 people were missing and feared dead.
Rescue crews battled to get to areas in the north of the country that have been cut off by mud or high water. And officials pointed out that several bodies had washed out to sea, some turning up on the island of La Tortue.
In addition, about 400 people were injured, many by falling roofs or homes that collapsed because of the weekend floods caused by Tropical Storm Jeanne.
In Gonaives, 450 houses were destroyed, according to the Haitian Civil Protection Office.
It said that in all, 250,000 people had to flee their homes, and aid agencies say many people were left with nothing.
The UN peacekeepers from Argentina based in Gonaives also were affected, as floods destroyed part of their barracks, leaving them without toilets or drinking water, and washing away some of their belongings.
"Three hundred of them lost their housing and many lost personal belongings," said Kongo-Doudou. "Despite this they are continuing to work, participating in the collection of bodies and manning a small improvised clinic," he said.
In New York, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan appealed for more aid.
"The secretary general urges the international community to quickly provide Haiti, one of the world's poorest countries, the support it needs to recover from this devastating natural disaster," a spokesman said.
Aid was already flowing in from Canada, Brazil, France and Venezuela, while the European Union, Switzerland, the United States and others pledged emergency funds.
Relief crews in Gonaives Wednesday started distributing emergency food trucked in from Port-au-Prince by the World Food Program, with further shipments due in from the CARE agency.
Also on the list of supplies needed in the area were bodybags and medical supplies.
"Given the contamination of water sources and the flooding of latrines, there are concerns about possible outbreaks of water-related diseases," the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said in a statement.
Relief officials said rebuilding Gonaives' Providence hospital would be a crucial task.
The hospital was ravaged by the floods, and witnesses said about 250 of the 300 patients were killed, or were missing. "We could only save the babies we carried to the roof," said nurse Helelald Wilner.
The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) sent a team to look for children orphaned by the killer floods.
"We have reports of abandoned children, either because their parents were killed or because they got lost," said Francoise Gruloos, who heads the UNICEF mission in Haiti.
The teams also planned to hand out balloons and games for children, "so there can at least be a semblance of joy," said Gruloos.
Amid fears of looting, security remained a concern as many policemen deserted their posts and hundreds of prisoners escaped in Gonaives during the floods.
Despite the deployment of nearly 3,000 UN peacekeepers, crime has risen in Haiti since former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide was deposed under opposition pressure and fled the country in February.
The poorest nation in the western hemisphere, Haiti had been further impoverished by flooding, which killed more than 1,200 people in May, as well as civil strife that left dozens dead earlier in the year.
In the Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti, authorities said the storm killed 27 people.
Jeanne was just the latest in a string deadly storms to slam the Caribbean region this year.