Heavy rains have displaced thousands of people and killed 12 as floods engorge parts of Kenya that are just beginning to recover from a drought, DPA QUOTED the Kenya Red Cross Society as saying on Thursday. The downpour began in the country's coastal region in mid-October. Five children were buried alive as a landslide tumbled over them and six others have been swept away or drowned in the submersion. In the country's dry and arid north, at least 24,000 people have been displaced by the flooding, worsened by soil parched after months of drought. One person has died there. "On the coast, when more rains come, the houses are washed away because of their poor construction," Kenya Red Cross Society information manager Zulekha Abass told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa. "In the north, the soil is dry because of the drought and can't absorb the heavy rains," she said. The Red Cross has distributed water purification tablets, mosquito nets, tarps and more to the thousands displaced by the rains. Kenya's north is recovering from a regional drought that left nearly 11 million people at risk of starvation.
