Why Pakistan is vulnerable to deadly floods? | Climate crisis news star-news.press/wp

Islamabad, Pakistan – More than 120 people have died in Pakistan due to climate -related incidents in the past three weeks, where the country’s arches for the start of the seasonal wind season.

In the latest Story reportAnd issued on Wednesday, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) revealed that a total of 124 people, including 63 children, have perished throughout the country since June 26.

NDMA has found that about two -thirds of deaths were caused by the collapse of the home and sudden floods, while drowning represents more than one in 10 deaths.

Pakistan, with a population of more than 250 million people, is one of the most vulnerable countries in the world in the world.

It has witnessed repeated environmental disasters, most notably the destructive floods in 2022, which killed nearly 1700 people and explained more than 30 million across the country, who lost their homes and livestock or suffered from crops or losses.

According to estimates at the time, 2022 floods caused $ 14.8 billion in property and lands and a loss of $ 15.2 billion in the country’s gross domestic product (gross domestic product).

The government of Pakistan blaming the lack of help from the international community in treating climate emergencies urgently, which causes flash floods and other disasters. However, some experts say that the government’s failure has doubled the current situation.

The latest numbers from NDMA show that Punjab and Khyber Bakhtongua’s provinces have suffered from most deaths, with 49 and 38, respectively, since June 24.

Lahore, the capital of the province in Punjab, witnessed heavy and intermittent rains last week that left many low areas in the city without electricity and led to severe water floating in the city’s narrow streets. Other areas in central and southern Punjab also suffered from heavy rains, as the country’s meteorological department expected more rains in the coming days.

Likewise, the boycott of Khyber Bakhtongua, where at least nine people from one family in the Swat River drowned during a picnic last month, and also faced heavy rains in different regions.

The Pakistani Meteorological Administration (PMD) has warned that the other strong seasonal weather system will strike most parts of Khyber Bakhtongua in the next few days, while Punjab is expected to get heavy shower.

The NDMA official, who asked not to be identified because he was not allowed to speak to the media, told Al -Jazeera that, according to weather forecasting, the authority does not expect to repeat “large -scale river floods at this stage.”

However, the official added that topical floods and urban floods are still a major concern throughout the country.

The official added that “NDMA issued early warnings and consultants to the provinces and the public and has the critical relief supplies arrested in the weak sites. We continue to monitor the situation through satellite -based systems, weather models, and land reports in the actual time.

How does climate change affect the crisis?

South Asian countries, including Pakistan, are receiving 70 to 80 percent of the annual rain during the seasonal wind season, which will continue from late June to September. This year, the damage caused by the monsoons due to the severe heat in the Gilgit region in the northern region of the country, which was called the “Third Pole” because it is home to many important glaciers in the world.

According to PMD, parts of the mountainous region recorded temperatures above 48 ° C (118 degrees Fahrenheit), although it is located at least 1,200 meters (4000 feet) above sea level.

Gilgit-Baltistan is home to thousands of glaciers and attract climbers from all over the world. A study last year by the Ministry of Pakistani Climate Change and the Italian Research Institute EVK2CNR provided that the country hosts more than 13,000 ice rivers.

Excessive heat accelerated in the melting of these ice rivers this year, which increased the risk of flood damage and infrastructure damage, as well as a severe threat to life, land and water.

Cetara Parvin, an environmental professor and assistant professor at Fatima Finnah, a degree in Gilgit, said that the hot wave in June caused a fast ice melting, with temperatures in some areas that broke nearly three decades.

“However, the risk of flooding with monsoon winds is high, taking into account the evidence from the” small ice age “, as the rains remained high with high temperature and there was less rain with a low temperature,” said Parvin Island Island.

The “Little Ice Age” was a period of regional cooling, which mainly affects the North Atlantic Ocean, from the early fourteen to the mid -nineteenth century.

“Given the high temperatures and the change of the human climate, the fragile ecosystems in Gilgit, Timistan faces imminent imminent flooding of the imbalance in the ice flood (GLOF) – a type of episodes caused by ice water,” said Zakir Hussein, Director General of the Disaster Management Authority in Gilgit, Tigistan, on the island.

Who blames the crisis in Pakistan?

Pakistan says that the international community does not do enough to help.

In 2023, UN Secretary -General Antonio Guterres argued that the international community is obligated to provide assistance, because Pakistan is only half a hundred of global greenhouse emissions, but its people are 15 times more likely to die than climate -related disasters.

After the floods in 2022, Pakistan hosted a global donor conference with the support of the United Nations in January 2023, when it was pledged about $ 10 billion by donor countries – albeit a lot in the form of loans. But by 2024, Pakistan received only $ 2.8 billion from these pledges.

Earlier this year, a former head of the Pakistani Central Bank said that the country will need annual investments between 40 and 50 billion dollars until 2050 to meet its challenges in the escalating climate.

However, while Pakistan is facing real climate risk, some experts argue that the crisis has been exacerbated by the failure of governance for a long time and bad policy decisions.

In many recent incidents, civil losses in Punjab and Khayber Pakhtunkhwa have been tracked to the illegal construction of homes near the river course and sudden floods that sweep the houses that were built badly.

The 2023 report issued by the United Nations, which enhances environmentally sustainable cities and towns, promoted the Pakistani Urban Planning problem, which revealed that rural migration to fast urban urbanization led to the criticism of the sprawling parties due to the lack of acute housing.

“This unparalleled demand has led to more than 50 percent of urban population residing in poor neighborhoods or unofficial settlements known as Katchi Abadis,” and mentioned the report.

NDMA officials say the agency has followed the multi -level preparation approach as the focus on the emergency response is not only, but also to reduce risks and early evacuation.

One of the officials said: “We have issued risks to the weak areas, and the provinces governments lead to the mobilization of the provinces departments to determine, and when necessary, the communities are transferred to great danger, especially those who live near NULLAHS (waterways), and between the banks of the river and hills exposed to ground collapse,” one of the officials said.

What do experts say?

Pakistani climate experts say that although climate change is a serious concern, its effect has doubled due to institutional failures.

“The damage and loss that he sees are the cost of failure to work.” He added that the houses are still built in the river course in a clear violation of the laws. “How is this rainy rain?”

The sheikh said that Pakistan’s lack of urban planning and the absence of willingness had left people vulnerable to a variety of risks, including river floods, urban floods and severe heat waves.

He said: “These are separate categories of challenges, and the scale of damage, both for people and infrastructure, is different because they have different dimensions of losses.”

The Sheikh also criticized the government’s failure to implement meaningful climate reforms, taking advantage that its response was limited to securing foreign loans and launching projects without internal structural changes.

He said: “I cannot think about one political reform that the government took after the floods of 2022, despite all the long allegations made by the ministers and other officials. Reforms focusing on the interior to enhance the readiness of societies in weak areas are completely missing.”

“We are a society of reform, and we do not want any major change in nature, and this position only perpetuates weaknesses.”

Neither NDMA nor the Ministry of Housing and Works did not answer questions from the island on these issues.