PAKISTAN: Rain adds to woes of those displaced by quake as President Musharraf seeks international help and donkeys help to deliver aid to quake victims

Record ID: 834566

  • Title: PAKISTAN: Rain adds to woes of those displaced by quake as President Musharraf seeks international help and donkeys help to deliver aid to quake victims
  • Date: 16th October 2005
  • Summary: MAJID SHOWING HIS DESTROYED HOUSE TO A VISITOR (SOUNDBITE) (Urdu) MAJID, RESIDENT OF BALAKOT SAYING: "My mother and brother they are still injured and they are in hospital and my youngest sister died and my younger brother he left half an hour before the earthquake for Rawalpindi and we don't have any information about him and we are still searching for him." MAJID WITH FRIEND VIEW OF MAJID IN TENT WITH GRANDMOTHER (2 SHOTS)
  • Embargoed: 31st October 2005 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Pakistan
  • City:
  • Country: Pakistan
  • Topics: Disasters / Accidents / Natural catastrophes
  • Reuters ID: LVA23NB4FMKFR22H4FRWWU01BAD3
  • Aspect Ratio:
  • Story Text: Heavy rain in northern Pakistan on Saturday (October 15) compounded both the misery of the survivors of last week's earthquake and the problems of those trying to help them, with helicopter flights severely disrupted and the danger of landslides again blocking roads the army has been struggling to clear.
    A week after the 7.6 magnitude quake killed at least 38,000 people in northern Pakistan and India, most in Pakistani Kashmir, relief officials were still trying to assess the scale of the disaster while rushing to bring in help before winter sets in.
    Homeless residents of Balakot woke up to a rain shower on Saturday (October15), making their already difficult life even more complicated.
    Aid has been pouring into the area in recent days. Much of the aid is from fellow Pakistanis who continue to send truck loads of supplies to Balakot.
    Majid, who is living in a tent with his grandmother, lost his sister under the rubble of his home which was destroyed during the earthquake. His younger brother is missing.
    "My mother and brother they are still injured and they are in hospital and my youngest sister died and my younger brother he left half an hour before the earthquake for Rawalpindi and we don't have any information about him and we are still searching for him," Majid told Reuters.
    Balakot, on the River Neilum, is filled with homeless people, many of whom are injured.
    Yet when 'Iftar' (breaking the fast) time comes the families do gather around a little fire and have their humble 'Iftar' meal, a tradition in Islam that brings families together around a table to have their first meal of the day.
    The homeless using the river for bathing and cleaning and cook their modest meals over a small wood fire that is kept burning throughout the night in an attempt to keep warm in the icy cold mountain temperatures.
    Pakistan's President Pervez Musharraf said on Saturday (October 15) that relief goods and food should be delivered in an organised manner so that it could reach earthquake victims immediately.
    "In the initial first stage we want to put them under tents and give them blankets, but then we have to give them accommodation and this accommodation has to be some high technology prefab stuff we can establish very fast, the faster the better," he said.
    Three Japanese air force helicopters arrived by a C-130 flight to Islamabad on Saturday to take part in the rescue and aid operations.
    Around 120 Japanese Self-Defense Force troops had arrived in Islamabad on Friday (October 14).
    Hundreds of villages are still inaccessible by road, cut off after the quake triggered landslides that either swept mountain roads away or blocked them.
    Donkeys are being used to transport relief goods to remote areas that cannot be reached by vehicle as the roads are blocked by landslides.
    Relief aid is being transferred to Shehid Galli village, which is around fifteen kilometres away from Muzaffarabad, by truck, before being loaded on donkeys to begin the tough mountainous trek.
    "There are no male member left there (in the villages), only women who cannot come and get relief goods" said donkey owner, Sharif before hitting the road for a journey that will take around six hours.
    Donkeys with heavy packs on their back will climb up hills, find their way through valleys and clamber over roads blocked by landslides to deliver the much needed aid.
    The convoy was organised by the Jamiat ud Dawa charity, an offshoot of a militant group fighting for an independent Kashmir that includes the Indian part.
    Donkeys are common across Kashmir and are used throughout the year to transport goods to rural villages, or bring goods to market.
    "No roads are there. We brought donkeys here, and we will load them and will deliver goods across the mountain" says another villager, named as Bashir.
    In a university campus in Muzaffarabad, where a tent city has been set up, quake victims huddled around fires to protect themselves against the bitter cold.
    Thousands have left the city on their own, travelling to the Pakistani lowland to stay with family and friends, but many people remain and they have been joined by survivors from devastated villages.
    In one tent, Sajed Hussain Shakih held up a a photograph of his wife and three children, all killed when their house collapsed during the quake.
    For now, looking after hundreds of thousands of victims remains a priority, a task that is being made difficult by the bad weather.
    Altaf Musani, a senior World Health Organisation disaster official, said efforts to provide medical aid were being completely hampered by the rain and the dangers of disease being spread by poor sanitation was exacerbated.
    "The issues also, people were out, in the open. It is cold, it is raining, people need shelter and it completely will effect the relief operations as well as increase the need on humanitarian scale," said Musani.
    New life emerged from the ruins of devastated Pakistani Kashmir on Saturday (October 15) when a woman rescued from an earthquake-devastated mountain village gave birth to a baby girl.
    The woman, Naseema Bibi, was outside her home in the remote Himalayan village of Paktika when the earthquake struck on Saturday (October 8) a week ago, her husband, Mohammad Munir said.
    Naseema Bibi was taken to an emergency clinic set up in a ruined army camp in Muzaffarbad, the capital of Pakistani Kashmir.
    The mother and baby, which was named Fareen, were resting inside the tent.
    Before the birth, the family of four had been camping out in the cold and wet after their home was destroyed.
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