"The dead victims comprise four families," the official, Pandi, told Elshinta radio.

The disaster hit a village in the district of Purwerejo following heavy rain the previous day.

The victims' houses at the foot of a hill were destroyed after tonnes of earth slammed into them, the official said.

A man was seriously injured in a separate landslide in the district.

Rescue workers were searching for the two people still feared buried in the mud.

The rainy season in Indonesia often brings floods and landslides. A landslide which swept through a small village in West Java earlier this month killed a mother and her three young children.

TERRA.WIRE