ISLAMABAD –
Deaths from widespread flooding in Pakistan topped 1,000 since mid-June, officials said on Sunday, as the country’s climate minister called the deadly monsoon season “a serious climate catastrophe.”
Flash floods from heavy rains have washed away villages and crops as soldiers and rescuers evacuated stranded residents to the safety of relief camps and provided food to thousands of displaced Pakistanis.
Pakistan’s National Disaster Management Authority reported that the death toll since the monsoon season started earlier than normal this year in mid-June has reached 1,061 people after new deaths were reported in different provinces.
Sherry Rehman, a Pakistani senator and the country’s top climate official, said in a video posted on Twitter that Pakistan is experiencing a “serious climate catastrophe, one of the harshest in a decade.”
“Right now we are at ground zero of the front line of extreme weather events, in a relentless cascade of heat waves, wildfires, flash floods, multiple glacial lake outbursts, flood events, and now the monster monsoon of the decade. is wreaking havoc. -Stop the chaos across the country,” he said. The statement on camera was retweeted by the country’s ambassador to the European Union.
Flooding from the Swat River affected the northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa overnight, 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 some 180,000 people have been evacuated from Charsadda and 150,000 from Nowshehra district villages.
Khaista Rehman, 55, no relation to the climate minister, took refuge with his wife and three children on the side of the Islamabad-Peshawar highway after their home in Charsadda was submerged overnight.
“Thank God we are now safe on this road quite high up in the flooded area,” he said. “Our crops are gone and our house is destroyed, but I am thankful to Allah that we are alive and I will restart life with my children. ”
The unprecedented monsoon season has affected all four provinces of the country. Nearly 300,000 homes have been destroyed, numerous roads have become impassable and power outages have been widespread, affecting millions of people.
Pope Francis said on Sunday that he wanted to ensure his “closeness to the populations of Pakistan hit by floods of disastrous proportions.” He said he prayed “for the numerous victims, for the injured and the evacuees, and for international solidarity to be prompt and generous.”
Rehman told Turkish news outlet TRT World that by the time the rains stop, “we could have a quarter or a third of Pakistan under water.”
“This is something that is a global crisis and of course we will need better planning and sustainable development on the ground. … We will need to have climate-resilient crops as well as structures,” he said.
In May, Rehman told BBC Newshour that both the north and south of the country were seeing extreme weather events due to rising temperatures. “So in the north, right now we’re… experiencing what are known as glacial lake outburst floods, of which we have a lot because Pakistan is home to the largest number of glaciers outside the polar region.”
The government has deployed soldiers to assist civil authorities in rescue and relief operations across the country. The Pakistani military also said in a statement that it had airlifted 22 tourists trapped in a valley in the north of the country to safety.
Prime Minister Shabaz Sharif visited flood victims in the Balochistan city of Jafferabad. He promised that the government would provide housing for all those who lost their homes.
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Associated Press writers Riaz Khan in Peshawar, Asim Tanveer in Multan, Pakistan, and Frances D’Emilio in Rome contributed.