Landslide at Shiite shrine in Iraq kills eight

A landslide collapsed the ceiling of a Shiite shrine in central Iraq and killed at least eight people, including a child, officials said.

It comes as rescuers continue to search for survivors.

The landslide struck Qattarat al-Imam Ali shrine near the holy city of Karbala, about 50 miles south of Baghdad, on Saturday.

According to Iraq’s civil defence, the landslide hit the ceiling of the shrine, which lies in a natural depression, causing it to cave in and dumping a stream of rock and mud inside the structure.

The entrance, walls and the minarets of the shrine, which was built on the place of a water source in the desert, remained standing.

Among the dead were five women, two men and a child, the civil defence said, adding that search teams had rescued six people.

On Monday, rescuers were using a bulldozer to try to remove the rubble and search for survivors.

The cause of the landslide was not immediately known, though the civil defence blamed high humidity.