Avalanche survivor rescued

RESTELICA, Kosovo – Rescuers have pulled a 5-year-old girl alive from the rubble of a house flattened by a massive avalanche that killed both her parents and at least seven of her relatives in a remote mountain village in southern Kosovo.

Col. Shemsi Syla, a spokesman for the Kosovo Security Force, said Sunday that officers discovered the girl when they heard her voice and cellphone. Her home was buried under 33 feet of snow.

Rescuers cheered late Saturday as the girl was pulled out alive after having been buried for more than 10 hours.

Osman Qerreti, an emergency official at the site, said at least nine members of her family died when the avalanche in the village of Restelica near Kosovo’s border with Macedonia and Albania destroyed seven houses, of which only two were inhabited.

“No bigger tragedy has ever struck this region,” said local district official Behar Ramadani. “Two brothers with their wives and children have been killed.”

The girl, identified as Asmira Reka, was recovering in a hospital in a nearby town. Doctors said her life was not in danger.

The cold snap in Europe, which began late January, has killed hundreds of people. Heavy snow has been blanketing the Balkans for more than two weeks, with Restelica and roads in the region blocked for days.

In neighboring Montenegro, where the government declared a state of emergency because of the deep freeze, special police forces on Sunday managed to reach about 50 train passengers stranded for two days after tracks were blocked by avalanches.

Police said a 55-year-old passenger had died from a heart attack Saturday night, while the others were sheltering in a nearby tunnel.

In Serbia, the snow continued to fall Sunday as some 50,000 people remained stranded in snowbound remote areas, some without electricity.