Cities across Africa face threat of landslides like Sierra Leone

DAKAR (Reuters) - Natural and human factors made Sierra Leone's capital vulnerable to a landslide that killed more than 400 people this week: heavy rain, deforested land and communities forced by overcrowding to live on steep hillsides.

Those vulnerabilities are mirrored in villages and cities across West and Central Africa - among the world's poorest and wettest regions - that face a worsening threat from landslides, researchers say.