Seoul seeks to ban basement flats after flooding deaths

SEOUL: South Korea’s capital has moved to ban the cramped basement flats made famous by Oscar-winning movie "Parasite" after four people drowned in subterranean dwellings during flooding caused by record-breaking rains this week.

Soldiers and relief workers were clearing debris on Thursday from waterlogged, mud-covered homes in Gwanak district, an AFP reporter saw, where three tenants, including a disabled woman and a teenager, died on Monday.

Their deaths -- trapped by floodwater in their basement apartment -- have caused public outrage, with President Yoon Suk-yeol visiting their destroyed home this week before calling on officials to do more to help the poor and vulnerable during natural disasters.