Ireland pledges €1.2m to Pakistan relief effort

MORE than four million Pakistanis have been made homeless by nearly three weeks of floods, the United Nations said yesterday, making the critical task of securing greater amounts of aid more urgent.

The UN had earlier said two million had lost their homes in the worst floods in Pakistan’s history.

Meanwhile, Ireland yesterday pledged almost €1.2 million to relief efforts. “Ireland’s response has been among the swiftest and most effective to this humanitarian crisis,” said Junior Minister Peter Power.

Power, Minister of State for Overseas Development, announced further humanitarian funding of €1.19m — in addition to €810,000 already given to agencies and in humanitarian supplies.

It will be channelled through established Irish Aid partners, including the UN and non-governmental organisations.

Aid agencies have been pushing for more funding as they try to tackle major problems such as food supplies, lack of clean water and shelter and outbreaks of disease.

Economic costs of the floods are expected to run into the billions of dollars, stepping up pressure on Pakistan’s government just after it had made progress in stabilising the country through security offensives against Taliban insurgents.

Floods have ruined crops over an area of more than 1.6 million acres, hammering the mainstay agriculture industry.

Flood victims are turning on each other as aid is handed out. The elderly sometimes take food from children as anger rises over the government’s perceived sluggish response to the crisis.

In the small town of Alipur in the agricultural heartland Punjab province, troops and police with batons charged flood victims trying to grab food unloaded from a helicopter.

Some waved empty pots and pans at a military helicopter, wondering, like millions of others, when food supplies will arrive.

Aninda Mitra, a Moody’s Investors Service analyst for Pakistan, doubts the disaster will have short-term implications on sovereign ratings.

“But in the long term, to what extent the economy can bounce back and recover is going to be quite crucial.”

The number of flood victims in urgent need of humanitarian relief has risen from six to eight million, the UN said.