Death toll in Philippine floods tops 1,000: official

MANILA: The number of people killed in flash floods triggered by a tropical storm in the southern Philippines has risen above 1,000, the civil defence chief told on Wednesday.

"I expect that (the death toll) will go up because there are still many missing," said Benito Ramos of the National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council, as he announced that rescuers had recovered 1,002 bodies.

Ramos said the death toll had surged in recent days as more bodies were recovered from the sea.

The storm struck the main southern island of Mindanao over the weekend, bringing heavy rains, flash floods and overflowing rivers that swept whole coastal villages away.

The hardest-hit areas were the southern port cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan where crowded shantytowns built on sandbars near the mouths of major rivers were swept away in the dead of night.

Navy and coast guard boats and three air force helicopters were still scouring the seas and recovering bodies, Ramos said.

"There are many more still unaccounted for. They are washing up on the beaches," he added.

Some cadavers were even being found on beaches almost a hundred kilometres (60 miles) away from the two coastal cities, he added.