The first day of the year is not one to celebrate for many in the southernmost provinces who began 2015 underwater from three weeks of flooding.
Flooding has receded in many parts of the region, but 1,830 villages in Phatthalung, Songkhla, Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat provinces remain flooded since mid-December when torrential rain hammered their homes for more than a week in the worst storms in more than two decades, the Disaster Prevention and Mitigation Department said Thursday.