Downpours hamper aid efforts :

Floods hit over 15 m Pakistanis

PAKISTAN: Torrential rains frustrated aid efforts in Pakistan Saturday, with some helicopters grounded as authorities battled to help 15 million people affected by the country’s worst ever floods.

Military rescue workers were rushing to evacuate families in the poor farming belt of Sindh province, where disaster officials were on red alert for a major deluge that could burst the banks of the swollen Indus river.

Fresh downpours hammered northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province where some helicopter services ferrying aid were suspended until the bad weather subsided, although forecasters said there would be at least two days of more rain.

“The situation is bad, particularly in the Swat valley, and we have advised people in low-lying areas to vacate their homes as river water levels are rising,” said Adnan Ahmed, a provincial official.

At least 11 people were killed and 31 injured when a truck carrying flood evacuees fell into a ditch after skidding off a slippery road in the northwestern district of Lower Dir, local police officer Mumtaz Zareen said.

The UN’s special envoy dispatched to help with the flood relief effort cancelled a flight to stricken areas, and Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani also postponed his trip for a day because of the rains.

Those uprooted from their homes in Sindh have been moved to relief shelters in government buildings, schools and tents, but many families in low-lying areas resisted evacuation, said irrigation minister Jam Saifullah Dharejo.

“I didn’t want to leave but when the water levels got high and we were hungry and couldn’t cook anything... my brother told me we should leave,” said Najma Bibi, 30, as she searched for food with her eight-year-old son. “My brother is back in our village trying to protect the wheat stocks, our clothes and other things in our home and we hope he will join us later,” she said.

Prime Minister Gilani has appealed for immediate international help to cope with the country’s worst floods in living memory, which have affected 15 million people nationwide, according to the national disaster management authority.

Countries including Britain, China, France and the United States have pledged tens of millions of dollars in aid for victims of the nearly two-week-old disaster.

The UN estimates at least 1,600 people have been killed by the floods that have ravaged the largely impoverished, insurgency-hit country, sweeping away entire villages.

In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, head of flood relief operations Major General Ghayoor Mehmood said some 1,400 people have been killed, with 213 still missing. Soomra , Sunday, AFP