AKIPRESS.COM - Rescuers were searching Wednesday for six people after an overnight landslide buried a small cluster of houses at the foot of a steep slope in southern Japan, AP reported.

The landslide, which occurred around 3:50 a.m., damaged four homes in Oita prefecture on Kyushu, the southernmost of Japan's four main islands, Japan's Fire and Disaster Management Agency said.

Four people from one house have been confirmed safe, but six are missing from the three others, Japanese government spokesman Yoshihide Suga said.