(TibetanReview.net, Sep08’26) – While China has said nothing about any devastation caused on towns, villages and other human settlements in Kyirong County in Tibet as a result of the catastrophic flash floods of ice, rock, mud, and, of course, water in the morning of Aug 26, the Tibetan Service of Radio Free Asia (rfa.org) reported Sep 6, citing a local Tibetan source, that 26 people had lost their lives in one village alone. However, the report did not say whether other villages and so forth were also hit by the flash flood.
China has officially confirmed that as of Sep 5, a total of 43 people had died on the Tibet side, with 519 people missing, including 261 foreign nationals from 23 countries.
The report cited the Tibetan resident as saying 26 people had died in Risur village, where the Gyirong Port is located.
The report also cited a Chinese resident from Kyirong Port, who wasn’t at the border crossing when the mudslide struck, as saying “No one at the border checkpoint appears to have survived,” adding about 800 people lived there.
An official CGTN video report carried by the state news outlet chinadaily.com.cn Sep 8 said the Gyirong Port was one of the first populated areas to be hit by the flash flood on the Tibet side. It did not say which other populated areas were hit there.
China’s official globaltimes.cn said Sep 7, citing CCTV News, that after hitting the Kyirong River, the high-speed flow of the debris of ice, rock, mud and water split in two directions, with one moving nearly 3 kilometres upstream and the other continuing downstream into Nepal for tens of kilometres.
The CGTN video report said the flash flood hit Kyirong river at the speed of a bullet train, covering 22 km in just 7 minutes to destroy 27 buildings there.
Meanwhile, the identities of some of the victims on the Tibet side have been confirmed. So far, none of the bodies retrieved are foreign nationals, reported China’s official Xinhua news agency Sep 8.
The report cited Yang Lahong, deputy director of the foreign affairs office of Tibet Autonomous Region as saying at a briefing that the names and specific information of missing foreigners had not been made public to protect their privacy, but had been shared with the relevant embassies through diplomatic channels.
The Indian Embassy in China on Sep 7 asked families of Indians missing since the Aug 26 flash flood to provide DNA samples to help identify them. The request came after Chinese authorities confirmed that they were now able to receive DNA samples from families of Indian nationals listed as missing in the disaster, indiatoday.in Sep 7 cited an Embassy press release as saying.