Authorities in Algeria say more than 700 people are now known to have died in the weekend's floods in the capital, Algiers, and the local media say the final toll could rise to more than 1,000.

Hopes have faded of finding anyone alive in the mud and rubble, and rescue efforts have turned into salvage operations.

International aid and badly needed supplies of fresh water have started arriving in the worst affected district of Bab el Oued.

Downpours last Friday and Saturday caused a mudslide that swept across several of the capital's hills, bringing down whole blocks of flats and many houses.

The Algerian Government has said it will offer housing and financial assistance to those hardest hit by the storm.

But at least one group of the 1,500 or so families left homeless and now sheltering in a school said they had still not received any official help.

Authorities have ordered the evacuation of more than 150 buildings in Bab el Oued after declaring them unsafe.

Search for children

Emergency teams are concentrating on a Turkish bath, where dozens of children were believed to have taken shelter.

People are digging in places where bodies are rumoured to be buried

"This is very difficult. They apparently sought refuge in the cellar of the bath and the area is buried under nearly three metres (nine feet) of dried mud," one rescue officer told Reuters news agency.

Three of the children's bodies were found and the others are presumed dead.

A French civil defence team brought in sniffer dogs, which the 3,000 Algerian rescue volunteers do not have.

Hospital emergency rooms have been packed with the injured and with worried people searching for their relatives.

The Red Cross and Red Crescent societies have launched a $1.2m appeal for the victims of Algeria's worst floods in 40 years.

Drains blocked

Angry youths have taken to the streets of Algiers over the last three days, shouting anti-government slogans, according to local reports.

Algerian media says the final death toll could be more than 1,000

The government is accused of having contributed to the devastation by deliberately blocking the drains in some of the poorer areas.

They did this in the early 1990s when Islamist militants used the drainage system to make their escape after carrying out assassinations and bomb attacks.

Although the militants were largely forced out of the city some years ago, the drains have never been unblocked, although Mohamed Ouchene, Algiers City Council Secretary General, told national television that drains in Bab el Oued were regularly maintained.