Buner, Pakistan — Pakistan issued a flood alert Wednesday for some southern districts, warning of torrential rains, as rescue teams continued searching for missing people in the country's northwest, where severe floods killed hundreds over the past week.

Officials say rescuers have recovered dozens more bodies from the rubble of collapsed homes in a northwestern district of Pakistan, bringing the death toll to at least 274, as authorities defended their response to the flooding and said they did not need any foreign help at this point.

By Sunday morning, the death toll from the rains across the mountainous north of Pakistan had risen to at least 337 people, with most killed in flash floods, according to the National Disaster Management Authority. In Buner, a three-and-a-half-hour drive from the capital Islamabad, 207 lives were lost and others are still missing.