Flood victims in Multan, Pakistan.
K.M.Chaudary/AP

Flood victims in Multan, Pakistan.

By every measure, flooding problems in Asia are staggering: China says new landslides have killed at least 24 people today as the death toll climbs above 1,100 people. Chinese officials say the threat of more rain-triggered landslides is 'relatively large'. There's flooding on the Yalu River, and misery in China and North Korea, whose secretive government has actually discussed recovery work. The BBC says 40,000 North Koreans are displaced, there are landslides and one city lost drinking water.

The U.S. Army estimates 20,000 people are cut off by flooding in northeastern Afghanistan, and is sending food and road building teams to the Abdullah Khel Valley.

Pakistan may be the scariest: the country's Meteorological Office expects a second wave of rain and flooding. The UN is worried about disease, saying the death toll of 1,500 could rise because so many people are getting sick. Engineers are watching the Kotri Dam. If it gives way, Hyderabad and its 2.5 million residents are right underneath. They're trying to get people out.

The World Meteorological Administration links the widening disasters to global warming:

While a longer time range is required to establish whether an individual event is attributable to climate change, the sequence of current events matches IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) projections of more frequent and more intense extreme weather events due to global warming. The Monsoon activity in Pakistan and other countries in South-East Asia is aggravated by the la Niña phenomenon, now well established in the Pacific Ocean.

RUSSIAN FIRES EASE

Breathing masks were needed last week to stroll in Moscow.
Mikhail Metzel/AP

Breathing masks were needed last week to stroll in Moscow.

That WMO report also links climate change to the Russian wildfires. Itar-Tass reports the fires have reduced 'two-fold' in the past day. Considering that 2 million acres are scorched, 4,000 people are homeless and at least 50 people died, that's some improvement. The New York Times reports many of the fires are impossible to control because they're in drained peat bogs.