“Climate Catastrophe”: Pakistan Flood Toll Passes 1,000

Floods in Pakistan from the highest rainfall in more than three decades have killed at least 1,000 people since June and caused damage worth more than $ 10 billion.
Extreme weather events, which followed some of the highest temperatures recorded throughout South Asia, were “climate disasters,” Sherry Rehman, Pakistani Federal Minister for climate change, in a news interview posted on his Twitter feed.

“Many districts are starting to look like part of the sea,” Rehman told German announcer DW News. “Sorti helicopter we did not find dry land to drop the ration.”

With more than 30 million people affected throughout Pakistan-the fifth most populous country in the worlds of the sea have been deployed for the first time, he added.

Minister of Finance Miftah Ismail said there was no immediate assessment of how bad the various economic sectors had been affected and damage could exceed $ 10 billion, local newspapers reported by News International.

“I don’t have money but hopefully the way out will be found,” Ismail told reporters on Monday. “Pakistan sinks. There is so much damage everywhere.”

Pakistan will allow imports of vegetables to be free of duty to curb price increases in the domestic market due to flooding and consider opening a temporary land route with India for this purpose, according to the Minister.

Pakistan has allowed temporary trading with neighbors in the past.

Natural disasters came because the government was faced with one of the fastest levels of inflation in Asia and tried to end the deficiency of the dollar. International monetary funds meet on Monday and are expected to continue the $ 6 billion loan program.

This was also given by former Prime Minister Imran Khan more political space when he pressed the government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to dissolve parliament and hold a new election. On Monday night, he hosted Telethon to raise funds for flood victims from his support base in the country and among Pakistani Extrates.

Khan’s political party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-insaaf, has approached the court for permission to broadcast telethon directly, according to local media reports. Khan has held such an event in the past, flanked by celebrities who work on the phone.

The former cricket star reminded his followers that his struggle against the government would not stop. The Sharif government has sought ways to prohibit the Khan party.

“Let me explain that our actual freedom movement will continue along with our flood assistance work,” he said in a tweet.

Khan has attracted many people to the demonstration since he was overthrown in the vote without trust in April. The campaign has produced results lately, with his party winning the key main election.

The Sharif government has sought assistance from international donors to handle intense climate events, which echoes warnings issued by scientists in reports 2021 from panels between government regarding climate change.

“We have to stop using words that have never happened before because every time a new precedent is formed in South Asia,” said Anjal Prakash, Director of Research at the Indian Business School at Hyderabad India and one of the main authors of the IPCC report. “The impact of heating on the Himalayan glacier, which retreats very quickly, is much faster than we thought before.”

Prakash said that the high temperature across the child who warmed the ocean, “very interrelated” to melt in the Indus river system in the Himalayas, which has caused flooding throughout Pakistan. The loss will force Pakistan to divert more economic resources to rebuild before global climate talks in Egypt this year.

Rainfall in Pakistan this monsoon season has exceeded levels recorded during the devastating flash floods in 2010, which promped $ 4.5 Billion in support from the IMF, the United Nations, World Bank and Asian Development Bank, according to a report by Karachi-based JS Global Capital Ltd. N of the natural disaster

The central bank of the country said last week that heavy rain could greatly affect agricultural output. Regulators have expected economic growth to fall from 6% last year to 3% to 4% this year starting in July.