KUNAR  - An avalanche engulfed houses and cut off roads in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, killing at least 45 people, the latest victims in the country’s worst winter in 30 years.
Heavy snow blanketed 13 houses and blocked roads leading into a district of Nuristan province, near the border with Pakistan, preventing help from reaching avalanche victims, deputy provincial governor Mohammad Nabi Ahmadi said. An entire village in northern Badakhshan province was covered by an avalanche almost a week ago, killing at least 50 people. Though avalanches are common in the mountainous north and east, the latest deaths are particularly painful during a winter that has killed dozens in the capital Kabul and created further food shortages in one of the world’s poorest countries.