Heavy rain and floods have soaked a third of Pakistan and killed more than 1,100 people, including 380 children when the United Nations requested assistance on Tuesday for what was described as “Climate Disasters that have never happened before.”
Army helicopters reap stranded families and drop food packages to areas that cannot be accessed as historical floods, triggered by extraordinary monsoon rain, destroying houses, businesses, infrastructure and plants, which have an impact on 33 million people, 15 % of 220 million South Asian countries.
The country has received nearly 190% more rain than an average of 30 years in the quarter to August this year, with a total of 390.7 millimeters (15.38 inches). Sindh Province, with a population of 50 million, the most devastated, got 466% more rain than an average of 30 years.
“One third of the country literally under water,” Climate Change Minister Sherry Rehman told Reuters, describing the scale of disasters as “unknown precedent disasters”.
He said water would not recede in the near future.
At least 380 children were among the people who were killed, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif told reporters during a briefing in his office in Islamabad.
“Pakistan is flooded with suffering,” said US Secretary General Antonio Guterres in a video message, when the United Nations launched an appeal of $ 160 million to help South Asia. “Pakistani people face monsoon on steroids – endless impacts from the level of rain and floods that are not stopping.”
Guterres will go to Pakistan next week to see the effects of “unprecedented climate disasters,” said the US spokesman.
He said the scale of climate disasters ordered world collective attention.
Nearly 300 people were stranded, including several tourists, flown in North Pakistan on Tuesday, a disaster management agent managed by the government said in a statement, while more than 50,000 people were moved to two government shelters in northwest.
“Life is very painful here,” Hussain Sadiq Village, 63 years old, who is in one of the shelters with his parents and five children, told Reuters, adding that his family had “lost everything.”
Hussain said that medical assistance was insufficient, and diarrhea and fever usually occur in shelters.
Head of Pakistani Army Qamar Javed Bajwa visited the North Valley of Swat and reviewed rescue and assistance operations, saying that “Rehabilitation will take a very long time.”
The United States will give $ 30 million to support Pakistani flood responses through USAID, its embassy in Islamabad said in a statement, saying the country “was very sad by the loss of life, livelihoods, and houses that destroyed throughout Pakistan.”
‘Obligation To Help’
Early estimates of placing damage due to flooding of more than $ 10 billion, said the government, adding that the world has an obligation to help Pakistan overcome the impact of man -made climate change.
The loss tends to be much higher, said the Prime Minister.
Heavy rain has triggered flash floods that have fallen from the northern mountains, destroyed buildings and bridges, and washed the roads and stood and served plants.
The volume of colossal water flows into the Indus River, which flows in the middle of the country from the north to the southern plain, carrying floods as long as it is.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari said hundreds of thousands of people lived outdoors without access to food, clean water, residence or basic health care.
Guterres said the $ 160 million that he hoped could be raised with an appeal would give 5.2 million people food, water, sanitation, emergency education and health support.
‘Not Enough Aid’
Prime Minister Sharif said that the amount of assistance would need to be “multiplied quickly,” Promise that “Every cent will reach those who need it, there will be no waste at all.”
Sharif was worried that the destruction would further thwart the economy that had experienced chaos, might cause lack of acute food and increase skyrocketing inflation, which was established at 24.9% in July.
Sowing wheat can also be postponed, he said, and to reduce its impact, Pakistan is already in talks with Russia for wheat imports.
General Akhtar Nawaz, Head of the National Disaster Agency, said that at least 72 out of 160 Pakistani districts had been declared a disaster.
More than two million hectares (809,371 hectares) of agricultural land are flooded, he said.
Bhutto-Zardari said Pakistan had become a zero ground for global warming.
“This situation is likely to deteriorate further because heavy rain continues in areas that have been flooded by more than two months of storms and floods,” he said.
Guterres appealed to a quick response to Pakistan’s request to the international community to get help, and called for the end “walking to the destruction of our planet by climate change.”
“The extreme monsoon flood tells us that there is no time to be wasted, the critical point of climate is here,” said Rehman, the Minister of Climate Change, added Pakistan was looking for a developed country not to allow him to pay for other countries’ carbon .