(29 May 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Manila, Philippines – 29 May 2024
1. P resident of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) Kate Forbes being interviewed by reporter
2. Forbes talking
3. IFRC and Philippine Red Cross flags
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Kate Forbes, president of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC):
"This is a terrible mudslide and at, partly, due to heavy rains and partly due to deforestation, and my understanding, we still have 2,000 people about missing and we are working desperately to get aid in."
5. Forbes during interview
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Kate Forbes, president of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC):
"We try to have the strong national societies there to give immediate aid, and then what we’re able to do after that is bring in other people from around the world, within the region, to help, and we will launch a campaign to raise money, we call an appeal to give long term relief to the folks at Papua New Guinea."
7. Close of IFRC pin
8. Mid of Forbes
9. SOUNDBITE (English) Kate Forbes, president of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC):
"Right now the issue is I understand is safety and access and as you can imagine we have to be sure that the land is somewhat stabilized before we can send our workers in to a great deal of extent, but we are well aware of it. We are in communication with the national society and we will be getting aid in as soon as we can."
10. Wide of interview
STORYLINE:
Authorities were searching on Wednesday for safer ground to relocate thousands of survivors at risk from a potential second landslide in the Papua New Guinea Highlands, while the arrival of heavy earth-moving equipment at the disaster site where hundreds are buried has been delayed, officials said.
Emergency responders say that up to 8,000 people might need to be evacuated as the mass of boulders, earth and splintered trees that crushed the village of Yambali in the South Pacific island nation’s mountainous interior on Friday becomes increasingly unstable.
The unstable ground was also impacting the humanitarian response, said Kate Forbes, president of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
“Right now, the issue is, I understand, … safety and access,” Forbes told reporters in Manila in the Philippines.
The United Nations estimated 670 villagers died in the disaster that immediately displaced 1,650 survivors.
Papua New Guinea’s government has told the United Nations it thinks more than 2,000 people were buried.
Six bodies had been retrieved from the rubble by Tuesday.
Papua New Guinea’s military earth-moving equipment had been expected to arrive at the scene on Tuesday after traveling from the city of Lae, 400 kilometers (250 miles) to the east.
But that plan changed when a bridge between the Enga provincial capital Wabag and the nearest airstrip at Mount Hagen collapsed late Monday for reasons that have yet to be explained.
A detour adds two or three hours to the journey for aid convoys taking supplies to Mount Hagan to the devastated village. It also has prevented the heavy equipment being trucked from Lae.
Five to 10 heavy earth-moving machines were now expected to be on the scene by Thursday, the Papua New Guinea Defense Force said.
Traumatized villagers are divided over whether heavy machinery should be allowed to dig up and potentially further damage the bodies of their buried relatives.
AP video shot by: Joeal Calupitan
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