Four dead as rains flood Baghdad

BAGHDAD (AFP) - The worst rains to hit Baghdad in 30 years left four people dead and many of the Iraqi capital’s residents struggling to cope with heavy flooding on Wednesday as the government declared a national holiday. Patients reported long and difficult journeys to hospitals, shopkeepers complained of a lack of business and several roads were immersed in water, in some cases as much as waist-high. In the predominantly-Shia northeastern district of Sadr City, the area surrounding Fatima al-Zahra hospital was completely flooded, and patients said trips that normally took 15 minutes had taken them as long as two hours.

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