UN warns 17,000 children need urgent aid after Nepal floods

NUWAKOT, Nepal - The United Nations' agency for children has warned that a staggering 17,000 young individuals are in desperate need of urgent humanitarian aid following catastrophic flash floods that ravaged the mountainous border region between Nepal and China. As the true extent of the devastation unfolds, survivors have taken refuge in makeshift army relief centers.

Efforts are underway to reunite children who have been separated from their families with their loved ones. The U.N. agency estimates that at least 17,000 children require immediate assistance, while 18 schools have been completely destroyed and another 20 left damaged. The International Red Cross has put the number of people affected at a minimum of 93,000, who are in dire straits.

Rescuers labored through mud and debris on Friday in areas decimated by the catastrophic flash flood along the mountainous frontier separating Nepal and China. In Nuwakot, one of the flood zones nearest to Kathmandu, entire villages were swallowed up in mere minutes, leaving behind a landscape cloaked in sediment and thick mud, with shattered remnants of a golden temple protruding from the sand.