UN official warns of ‘disaster within disaster’: •Organized relief stressed •Billions of dollars needed for rehabilitation
By Baqir Sajjad Syed
ISLAMABAD, Oct 14: United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland on Friday warned of a ‘disaster within disaster’ if relief efforts were not effectively coordinated.
“If we don’t work together and organize our generosity .... we may have a disaster within a disaster,” he told a press conference at the UN Information Centre, saying that the international community had not put in enough resources for relief measures.
The rehabilitation work might require billions of dollars, said the relief coordinator after a two-day visit aimed at assessing the extent of the destruction. “To reconstruct this will take five to 10 years,” he said.
Over 100 international relief agencies and even a greater number of local groups are busy providing relief to the Oct 8 earthquake victims.
Mr Egeland, who is also UN under-secretary general, said the ‘flash appeal’ issued by the UN earlier this week had so far been able to attract pledges of $50 million. Commenting on the response, he said: “This was not enough and more would be required”.
The total assistance coming in from various sources has been put at $225 million.
He spoke about extraordinary difficulties and bottlenecks being confronted in relief efforts. “The operation is a logistical nightmare and in the first phase even the major cities could not be reached.”
Mr Egeland also called for prioritising relief efforts so that those who had lost everything could be reached. He did not endorse the government assertion that only 20 per cent of the affected areas were inaccessible. He believed that a much greater area was still out of reach of relief workers.
Appealing to the international community for more helicopters and tents, he said roads might not be there by the time winter approached. Therefore, more helicopters would be needed. Besides, tents would be required to shelter one million people.
Referring to his meeting with President Gen Pervez Musharraf, the UN official said the president had accepted his request for simplifying procedures for international relief groups and workers reaching Pakistan. The facilitation by the government would help the relief workers get visa, bring in custom-free consignments and conduct flight operations.
Speaking on the occasion, UN Resident Coordinator Jan J. Vandemoortele made a passionate appeal for fortifying relief efforts and strengthening coordination among relief groups, saying “one disaster has occurred; we should prevent another one from happening.”
Describing the situation as desperate, the UN representative said the job ahead for relief agencies was colossal.
AFP adds: UN and British officials said on Friday that donors were already planning a massive reconstruction effort that would require billions of dollars over five to 10 years.
Northern Pakistan will need everything from hundreds of rebuilt medical clinics and schools to a whole new network of roads, which remain so torn apart that an untold number of desperate survivors remain out of aid’s way.
British diplomat Yusaf Samiullah said international donors such as the World Bank, Britain and Japan would form a team of experts to come up with a detailed proposal to Pakistan’s government on how to rebuild.
“This thinking about reconstruction has already started and it will be done alongside the relief efforts ... to help people survive the winter,” said Mr Samiullah, stationed at the British embassy in Islamabad with the Department for International Development.
He said the UN appeal for $272 million, launched on Tuesday, was a stop-gap measure for short- to medium-term relief and a subsequent appeal for reconstruction funds would involve a “much larger number”.
“This much larger number will be clear in about four to five weeks because the expert teams will have much more detailed calculations,” Mr Samiullah said.
Mr Egeland said the immediate appeal would likely be upped. He said he was urging the world “to think of how much it takes to get a roof for more than one million people in the space of days and weeks”.
“I am overall fairly optimistic. I think in the next week we will have a much bigger relief effort.
“But we must not forget the people who will be spending their seventh night tonight — they should not need to spend an eighth or ninth night in cold and colder climate,” he said.
ISLAMABAD, Oct 14: United Nations Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland on Friday warned of a ‘disaster within disaster’ if relief efforts were not effectively coordinated.
