Afghan Landslide Buries Hundreds of Homes --- KABUL, Afghanistan — Huge landslides caused by heavy rainfall buried hundreds of houses in a remote area of northeastern Afghanistan on Friday. As many as 2,500 people were said to be missing in the disaster, one of the worst to hit the war-torn country in at least a decade. -- Weeks of steady rain softened the hillside above the village of Abi Barak in the Argo district of Badakshan Province, near the borders with China and Tajikistan. Officials said one part of the hill gave way around 11 a.m., burying about 300 houses — by some estimates nearly half the village — in a mass of sodden mud. Neighbors who rushed to help were buried when a second part of the hill slid a short time later. -- “I believe it is beyond human capability to even remove all of the dead bodies,” said Shah Waliullah Adeeb, the governor of Badakhshan. “It will take months for machinery to complete the search for bodies.” -- Initial reports on the toll from the landslide were sketchy. Government officials said that up to 2,500 people could have been buried. The United Nations said late on Friday that the death toll was at least 350. -- The extent of the devastation was also unclear, in part because it was difficult to communicate with the area because the landslides had knocked down cellphone towers, officials said. -- Aid efforts began almost immediately. Surviving villagers were moved to neighboring areas for safety. President Hamid Karzai ordered his second vice president, as well as the army, the directorate of local government and officials in Badakshan, to take every available action to aid the affected families. -- The United Nations, which is helping coordinate the relief, said that there were adequate humanitarian supplies in the area, and that emergency funds would be available if more was needed. Afghan officials said that 130 tons of flour, 60 tons of rice and 10 tons of sugar were already on the way to the area and that senior officials would fly there on Saturday with cash to aid displaced families. -- Natural disasters are a particularly cruel feature of life in Afghanistan, which is already contending with a deadly insurgency, crippling poverty and a flagging economy. Avalanches, floods and landslides claim dozens of lives each year. The government does its best to cope and gets extensive international assistance, but the country’s mountainous geography, limited road network and harsh political and economic realities often make it difficult to mount relief efforts. - More, NYTimes