Sharjah24 – AFP: Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet will huddle Wednesday to approve a massive relief package to rebuild German regions destroyed in historic flooding and better protect them in future.
A week into the region's worst flooding disaster in living memory, which has killed at least 169 people in Germany and 200 in Europe, the right-left "grand coalition" government will unblock aid for demolished homes, businesses and vital infrastructure.
With the damage estimated in the billions of euros, Merkel told reporters on a visit to the badly hit medieval town of Bad Muenstereifel on Tuesday that Berlin would come through to help in the short and long term.
"This was flooding that surpassed our imagination when you see the destruction it wrought," Merkel told reporters after touring what the Bild daily called the "apocalyptic" wreckage of the 17,000-strong community in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) state.
She said ministers would clear the way for emergency assistance for citizens who had suffered losses and do everything in their power "so that the money is with people fast".
"I hope it will be a matter of days," she said, noting that she had met local victims "left with nothing but the clothes on their backs".
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