Pakistan issued new flood warnings yesterday as more rains fell and rising water levels threatened to overwhelm one of the country’s biggest dams.
A UNICEF official said about 3.2 million people had been affected by the flooding across the country — 1.3 million severely. The total included 1.4 million children under the age of 18, the official said.
The UN said about 980,000 people had lost their homes or been temporarily displaced, and that the figure was likely to rise above a million.
PHOTO: EPA
Relief work has been hampered by submerged roads, washed out bridges and downed communication lines, and survivors have complained about government inaction. Other countries have pledged assistance to Pakistan.
In the northwest, the hardest-hit region, new downpours added to the misery.
Rising water levels at Warsak Dam, the country’s third-biggest, prompted disaster officials to ask residents in the northern outskirts of Peshawar city to leave their homes.
“If needed, forced evacuation will be started,” said Adnan Khan, a spokesman for the Disaster Management Authority of Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa Province.
As bloated rivers flowed away from the northwest, they began to inundate villages in Punjab Province in the east. Villagers in Mianwali, Layyah, Taunsa Sharif and Rajanpur were affected as floodwaters began to seep into their homes. Punjab is Pakistan’s most populous province and home to many of its biggest farms.
The Pakistani army, which has the helicopters, boats and infrastructure needed for relief work, is delivering food, medicine and tents, as are government agencies and several different political parties and welfare organizations.
However, many flood victims were unhappy with the response. About 300 people blocked a major road in the hard-hit Nowshera district to protest at receiving little or no aid, witnesses said.
Anger was also growing over Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari’s trip to Europe.
“Zardari should visit the flood-hit areas and take steps for welfare of the stranded people instead of taking joy rides to France and UK,” said Sher Khan, 40.
At least one extremist group — a welfare organization allegedly linked to the Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist network — was also helping survivors. The group, Falah-e-Insaniat, helped civilians fleeing the Swat offensive, as well as after other disasters.
The US and other foreign countries, aid groups and the UN have promised or are delivering aid, but for victims now mostly surviving in baking hot camps or in the open, it cannot come quick enough.
“This is the only shirt I have,” said Faisal Islam, sitting on a highway median, the only dry ground he could find in Camp Koroona village in the northwest. “Everything else is buried.”
Pakistan’s National Disaster Management Authority said more than 29,500 houses were damaged and a key trade highway to China was blocked by flooding.
Officials said it was too early to estimate the damage the floods had caused to the economy, but the rains had so far spared the main agricultural heartland in the Punjab.
“The entire infrastructure we built in the last 50 years has been destroyed,” said Adnan Khan, spokesman for the provincial Disaster Management Authority in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
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