Death count cross 900, Pakistan seeks international aid to cope with flood emergency

 

In an interview with a foreign news channel, the Minister said the death toll has gone up to 903 due to massive flash flooding.

Federal minister said  that thousands of people are homeless without shelter and food and communication lines have been completely cut off.

The country is in need for immediate humanitarian and rescue efforts to rehabilitate the aggrieved and flood-hit populations.

Federal goverment a day earlier has stablised Prime Minister’s Flood Relief Fund 2022.

Information Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb urged all Pakistanis to donate generously to the fund as total deaths due to the ongoing rains crossed 900, with tens of thousands still without shelter or food.

In a series of posts on Twitter, Marriyum Aurangzeb said the State Bank of Pakistan had issued a circular to all commercial banks for collecting donations to help the rain-afflicted population of the country. Both local and overseas Pakistanis can donate to this fund, she said, stressing that this year’s rainfall had broken 30-year records.

“The entire country, especially Balochistan and Sindh, have suffered an unprecedented disaster,” she wrote.

“We should all come together to help our troubled countrymen and provide them support,” she added. Providing details of the account in which donations could be deposited, she said all commercial banks could collect the funds, adding overseas Pakistanis could send their aid through wire transfers, money service bureaus, money transfer operators and exchange houses. Donations could also be deposited through mobile and internet banking and ATMs, she said.

 

As per the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), heavy monsoon rainfall and floods have affected some 2.3 million people in Pakistan since mid-June, destroying at least 95,350 houses and damaging a further 224,100.