Avalanche kills 19 on Pak-Afghan border

Official says 19 bodies have been recovered from under the debris, search still underway

JALALABAD:

At least 19 people were killed by an avalanche on Monday while crossing a remote mountain pass from Afghanistan to Pakistan, a Taliban official said.

Najibullah Hassan Abdal, head of information for eastern Kunar province, told AFP rescue workers were still searching at the scene of the avalanche. “Nineteen bodies have been recovered already,” he said.

Scores of Afghans cross illegally to Pakistan every day through the porous mountain border in search of jobs or to buy goods for trade.

Also read: India glacier avalanche leaves 18 dead, more than 200 missing

Traders and smugglers have for centuries used well-trodden remote mountain passes to criss-cross the territories and avoid paying taxes.

Dir roads cleared of snow

Across the border in Pakistan, the Army and Frontier Corps (FC) completed the operation in Dir to clear the snow off the road, clearing the way for the traffic and rescuing several vehicles stuck on Rawalpindi-Chitral highway near the Lowari Tunnel.

At least 250 people, including women and children, were stranded in their vehicles in Dir since midnight Sunday due to intense snowfall in the region. The passengers were traveling from Rawalpindi to Chitral. The troops also distributed food among those stranded in the snow.

The district administration had started the rescue operation at noon to clear off the roads. The army and FC troops soon arrived to assist the local administration, clearing the roads for traffic with the help of heavy machinery.