Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari said Sunday night that flooding caused by weeks of extreme monsoon rains and melting glaciers will worsen Pakistan’s already dire economic situation and that financial aid is needed. “Going forward, I would expect not only the International Monetary Fund, but the international community and international organizations to really realize the level of devastation,” he said. “I’ve never seen devastation on this scale, it’s very hard to put into words … it’s overwhelming,” he said. Many crops that provided much of the population’s livelihood had disappeared, he added. “Obviously this will have an impact on the overall economic situation,” he said. Map of Pakistan The South Asian nation faces high inflation, an undervalued currency and a current account deficit, and Bhutto-Zardari said he hoped the flood emergency would persuade the IMF’s board this week to release $1.2 billion as part of the seventh and eighth tranche of Pakistan’s bailout program. The first foreign aid began flowing into Pakistan on Monday on flights from Turkey and the United Arab Emirates – the start of a massive relief operation to relieve a disaster that has affected some 33 million people and left large swathes of the country flooded. At least 1,061 people have died in the floods and the toll is expected to rise further, with many communities in the mountainous northern regions cut off by flood-swollen rivers that have swept away roads and bridges. Army helicopters struggled to get people to safety in the north, where steep hills and valleys make for treacherous flying conditions. Several rivers in the area – a picturesque tourist destination – have overflowed their banks, toppling dozens of buildings, including a 150-room hotel that collapsed in a raging torrent. It came as the country’s climate minister warned that a third of Pakistan could be under water by the time this year’s “monster monsoon” recedes. Pakistan has never seen an uninterrupted monsoon cycle like this. 8 weeks of non-stop floods have left huge areas of the country under water. This is not a normal season, this is a flood from all sides, affecting 33 million plus people, which is the size of a small country. @dwnews pic.twitter.com/gYAbv9ldlH — SenatorSherryRehman (@sherryrehman) August 28, 2022 Sherry Rehman, a Pakistani senator and federal minister for climate change, told AFP on Monday: “What we are seeing now is an ocean of water submerging entire regions. This is far from a normal monsoon – it’s climate dystopia on our doorstep.” Rehman said on Sunday that the warming climate was causing glaciers in the mountainous northern regions to melt faster than normal, exacerbating the effects of heavy rainfall. Pakistan has more glaciers – 7,532 – than anywhere outside the polar regions. It makes Pakistan one of the countries most exposed to extreme weather related to climate change, said Simon Bradshaw of the Australia Climate Council, and has suffered a “series of weather disasters such as drought and floods”. A woman checks her damaged house in the aftermath of floods in Charsadda district, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Pakistan. Photo: Arshad Arbab/EPA The extreme weather, which has also affected China, Europe and the US in the Northern Hemisphere summer, was becoming harder to predict as a warming atmosphere made events more erratic, he said. It was important for developed countries to do more to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels, Bradshaw said. “Typically, countries that contribute least to the warming problem, such as Pakistan, pay the highest price in terms of weather disasters.” Flooding from the Swat River over the weekend affected the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where tens of thousands of people especially in Charsadda and Nowshehra districts have been evacuated from their homes to relief camps set up in government buildings. Many have also taken refuge on roadsides, said Kamran Bangash, a spokesman for the provincial government. Bangash said 180,000 people were displaced from Charsadda and 150,000 from villages in Nowshehra district. The unprecedented monsoon season has affected all the four provinces of the country. Nearly 300,000 homes have been destroyed, many roads are impassable and power outages are widespread, affecting more than 33 million people – one in seven Pakistanis. Pakistan’s prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, appealed for help on a visit to the hard-hit Balochistan province. “I have never seen such a flood in my personal and professional life. All four corners of Pakistan are under water. I’m asking people to come forward and help.” Sharif was told during his visit to Jafarabad district in Balochistan that at least 75% of the province, Pakistan’s least developed but which accounts for half of its land area of about 350,000 square kilometers (135,000 sq mi), was affected by the floods. In total, Pakistan covers almost 800,000 square kilometers. The government has deployed soldiers to assist civil authorities in rescue and relief operations across the country. Pakistan’s military also said in a statement that it had airlifted 22 tourists trapped in a valley in the north to safety.
