Pakistan death toll from rains, flood reaches 320; PM visits Balochistan

Agencies | Karachi                                                          

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Pakistan Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif has visited flood-ravaged Balochistan province and assured the affected people of all possible help in their rescue and rehabilitation as the death toll from the monsoon rains and flash flooding across the country on Sunday reached 320.

Balochistan province is the worst affected due to the heavy rains and flash floods and has recorded 127 deaths so far.

Prime Minister Sharif while talking to media after visiting Quetta on Saturday announced compensation packages for those killed or displaced during the heavy monsoon rains and flash flooding which have been going on across Pakistan for the last five weeks.

Since mid-June, the monsoon rains have led to swollen rivers and damaged highways and bridges, disrupting traffic all across the country.

Sharif said that some 13,000 houses have been fully destroyed or partially damaged in Balochistan, which recorded the highest death toll, followed by Sindh including Pakistan's biggest city Karachi where around 70 people have lost their lives in rain-related incidents in five weeks.

According to the National and Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA), there have also been around 60 fatalities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province and another 50 in Punjab.

Shahbaz Sharif visited the areas affected the most by the rain induced floods and met with affected people, promising them all possible help from the federal and provincial governments, including compensation packages of one million rupees for each victim.

Naseer Ahmed Nasar, the Director-General PDMA in Balochistan, said that till Saturday 127 fatalities had been reported across the province.

He said rescue workers found 11 more bodies in the Noshki, Lasbela, Chaghi, and Zhob districts of Balochistan.

We know 46 children and 32 women are also among the dead," he added.

The Pakistan Army, Frontier Corps, and rescue workers from the PDMA were carrying out rescue and relief operations in all floods affected parts of Balochistan.

Thousands of stranded people in the Lasbela and Jhal Magsi districts of Balochistan had been rescued in the operation so far while floods had damaged around 13,000 mud-walled houses in Quetta, Pishin, Jaffarabad, Khuzdar, Kohlu, Barkhan, Lasbela and Jhal Magsi districts of Balochistan.

The floods have also led to a suspension of train service between Pakistan and Iran after various portions of railway track between the two countries were washed away.