By PATRICE CITERA, Associated Press Writer

KINSHASA, Congo – A riverboat loaded with passengers and fuel drums caught fire and capsized in southern Congo, and 200 people were feared dead, a survivor said Sunday. Another survivor confirmed the account and said local fishermen refused to help drowning passengers who jumped off the crowded boat.

The incident that happened Saturday evening would be the deadliest boat accident in the Central African nation this year, and among the worst in Africa this year.

The boats that traverse Congo's rivers are often in poor repair and filled beyond capacity, with little regard for safety. The industry is not well-regulated and boat operators are known to fill boats to dangerous levels.

A local official confirmed the boat had tipped but said the passenger manifest apparently vanished in the fire.

Fabrice Muamba, who said he was on the boat when it caught fire Saturday night on the Kasai River, said he thought only 15 of the more than 200 people he thought were aboard were able to swim to safety. He said passengers began to jump overboard when the engine caught fire as it passed the remote village of Mbendayi, some 45 miles (70 kilometers) from the town of Tshikapa, which is north of Congo's border with Angola.

Another survivor, a woman named Romaine Mishondo, said the boat was already packed with "hundreds" of passengers when it stopped some 10 minutes before the fire to pick up more people.

She said she did not know exactly how many people were aboard, but said the boat was so crowded it reminded her of "a whole market in the village full of people."

But when the fire started and people began jumping overboard, she said nearby fishermen ignored drowning passengers' pleas for help.

"Fishermen attacked the boat and started beating passengers with paddles as they were (trying) to loot goods," she said. "The fishermen refused save passengers, instead taking goods into their pirogues. ... I survived because I hung onto a jerrycan until another vessel passed by the scene and rescued us."

Boat owner Mwamba Mwati Nguma Leonard said a survivor and an employee called to tell him the boat caught fire when workers spilled fuel and ignited the engine.

"At the moment I am crying after learning my boat caught fire," Leonard said. "I was just told on phone that it was while seamen were putting fuel into the tank that an explosion occurred after the oil touched the vessel's battery."

He said he has asked police to arrest the boat's managers as he believes they employed unskilled workers.

But he said he had no further details because he was in Congo's capital, Kinshasa, some 500 miles (800 kilometers) from the scene, and because his employees on the scene did not answer his calls Sunday.

"Since I am far away in Kinshasa, I cannot confirm at the moment the exactly what happened," he said.

Leonard also confirmed Muamba's account that the boat was carrying many drums full of fuel on its journey through Kasai Occidental Province. Leonard said the boat also was carrying sacks of maize. He said he did not know how many people were aboard.

Francois Madila, an official from the navigation department in the province, said police arrested two of the vessel's sailors and are investigating the incident. Madila said the sailors have not said how many people were aboard and that the passenger list appeared to have disappeared in the fire.

Other officials and witnesses in the remote area could not be reached for comment Sunday.

The incident is the deadliest of several boating incidents reported this year in Congo.

In July, officials said at least 80 people died when a boat ferrying about 200 passengers to Congo's capital capsized after hitting a rock.

In May, dozens of people died when an overloaded canoe capsized on a river in eastern Congo. And last November, at least 90 people were killed after a logging boat sank on a lake in Congo. The timber-carrying vessel was not supposed to be carrying passengers.

Congo is a vast country of jungles and huge rivers in Central Africa with little more than 300 miles (480 kilometers) of paved road. Many people prefer to take boats even if they do not know how to swim.

By MOISES CASTILLO, Associated Press Writer

NAHUALA, Guatemala – Torrential rains from a tropical depression caused landslides that have killed at least 38 people in Guatemala — some of them rescuers who had come to save people already trapped by a wall of mud.

In the village of Nahuala, about 200 rescue workers searched through mud and rocks for bodies on Sunday after two landslides in the same spot killed at least 20 people along a highway leading northwest of the capital toward Mexico. Another slide closer to Guatemala City killed at least 12.

A slide Saturday afternoon had trapped vehicles at kilometer 171 of the Inter-American highway, and some of the people who came to rescue them were themselves caught by a second slide, officials reported.

"Under the earth there is a bus that carried we don't know how many people, and there are those who tried to help the victims of the first slide," regional fire department Maj. Otto Mazariegos said.

Rescue crews have recovered 20 bodies from that site, said fire department spokesman Jose Rodriguez. He said at least 60 people are missing.

A few hours earlier, a landslide at kilometer marker 81 of the same highway partially buried a bus, killing 12 people.

On Sunday, Colom visited the area of the mudslides and said that Monday will be declared a national day of mourning. He asked local officials to determine the actual number of missing.

Speaking a day earlier, even before news of the second highway slide was known, Colom said, "It is a tragic day. Today alone 18 people have died, 12 buried by a hill when the traveled in a bus." Four children and two adults died in slides elsewhere, he said.

The president told officials to close the highway for fear of more slides.

"There are several hillsides that are loose and could fall. So we ask the population to not go out, to avoid moving along the highways," he said — not long before new slides took more lives.

Heavy rains from Tropical Depression 11-E have pelted Guatemala for days, unleashing deadly mudslides in several areas, cutting highways and forcing officials to evacuate thousands of people.