UN aid for Pak flood victims to focus on survival needs of six million people

GENEVA - The United Nations has said that aid for Pakistan flood victims will focus on the survival needs of six million people.

“We are focusing for now on six million people who are in need of direct humanitarian assistance, meaning that they need it to survive,” said Elisabeth Byrs, a spokeswoman for the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).

Byrs said the figure of 14 million affected was a broader measure given by Pakistani authorities.

UN Under Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs John Holmes will launch the international appeal for funds in New York today (Wednesday), along with Pakistani officials; the Daily Times quoted Byrs, as saying.

She said that the number of victims targeted by the appeal had yet to be finalised, but it is likely to be among one of the biggest relief efforts in the UN’s history.

The huge scale of the devastation wrought by monsoon rains from the north to the south of Pakistan was testing aid agencies “to their limits”, said Andre Mahecic, a spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. (ANI)