Pakistan: IFRC calls for 23.9 million Swiss francs to help 140,000 displaced

My lasting posting gave details of the grave humanitarian situation in Pakistan. We have just launched an appeal to help the Pakistan Red Crescent Society in its work assisting the displaced people.


The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) has launched an emergency appeal seeking 23,926,179 million Swiss francs (22.44 million US dollars or 15.76 million euro) to help the Pakistan Red Crescent Society (PRCS) meet the humanitarian needs of 140,000 people displaced from the areas of fighting.

Latest reports suggest that more than 2 million people have fled their homes, making this the largest and fastest growing displacement in 15 years. The majority of the displaced people are now staying with host families outside the areas where hostilities are occurring.

Pakistan is currently facing a growing humanitarian crisis triggered by fierce fighting between government security forces and militants. There was an increase of around 100,000 displaced people in the last ten days of May alone. This growing displacement illustrates the uncertainty of the timeframe of these hostilities and illustrates the massive humanitarian needs that exist, both for the displaced and the families who are sheltering them.

“Seeing the magnitude of the problem, it is urgent that all Red Cross and Red Crescent partners join hands together to help the people,” says Ilyas Khan, PRCS secretary general.

Since the end of April, in addition to the direct implementation of its own assistance programmes, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has been actively supporting the PRCS emergency response. These operations aim to address the needs of civilians, focussing on the sick and wounded and the displaced in the Mardan, Swabi, Malakand, Dir and Nowshera districts.

The PRCS plan for an International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement response will support around 400,000 displaced people in the emergency phase of the operation,some 50,000 people in camps and 350,000 staying with host families.

Within that plan, the IFRC emergency appeal will complement the PRCS and ICRC joint efforts through timely response to 70,000 internally displaced people (10,000 families) in non-conflict areas during the emergency phase and another 70,000 (10,000 families) will be supported for early recovery. Support will be focused on those staying with host families, but this appeal will also enable the PRCS to provide services in one camp that is outside of areas where fighting is occurring.

“With the humanitarian crisis growing, the needs have become far greater,” says Pepe Salmela, head of the IFRC in Pakistan. “The uncertainties regarding the ongoing clashes, as well as its time frame, add to the urgency for a timely, well-coordinated, and efficient humanitarian response.”

The timeframe of this operation is to the end of 2009.

Funds needed to reach 2.6 million displaced Pakistanis

I saw the birth of the Talebans in early 1994 when I lived in Afghanistan and had to work closely with them in order to get assistance to vulnerable communities in remote parts of Afghanistan. Then when 9/11 occured, I was back in Pakistan heading a large operation for Afghan refugees who fled into Pakistan. Again in October 2005, it was a disaster of a different kind, a huge eathquake in northern Pakistan, killing 80,000 people. And over the past we have witnessed another huge humanitarian crisis in Pakistan that I followed through a blog of a young teenage Pakistani women who recorded the horrors unfolding on her blog from the Swat valley on the BBC website. Today, modern technology allows you to read the terror first hand. If anything, it makes me feel more helpless when I read of a young woman caught in the crossfire of a major battle and sees people being killed and murdered all around her. I suppose what warms my heart is I know the Pakistan Red Crescent, the ICRC and the IFRC are doing everything possible to assist the displaced people.

My good friend Joe Lowry writes : "One of the biggest exoduses of modern times is under way in Pakistan. Two and a half million people have been displaced - a dozen times the populaiton of Geneva, and yet we hear relativley little about their plight in this "little Switzerland". Check out this blog
http://headdowneyesopen.blogspot.com/2009/06/shame-of-swat_01.html

The International Committee of the Red Cross yesterday (31 May) gained access to Swat valley for the first time since hostilities began. Their team reported hospitals lacking the barest necessities - we're talking without water or electricity - in an area where people are most likely receiving horrific injures, and suffering from food shortages and waterborne diseases.

Nothing is getting in, not even the spoken word, as phone lines are down. Mingora has obviously been a scene of carnage. The footage coming out evokes Mogadishu, and the "theatre" must be as dangerous for the aid workers going in as it was in Somalia back in the early 90s. To them, chapeau, and sincerest wishes for their continued safety.

On the 3rd of June we got this statement from the UN.
Without the contribution of urgently-needed funds, the United Nations and its partners will only be able to feed the 2.6 million Pakistanis forced to flee clashes between the Government and militants for the next month or two, it was announced today.


According to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the world body has less than half of the $280 million sought to meet the food needs of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Pakistan.
In addition, the $543 million Humanitarian Action Plan launched late last month is only 22 per cent funded. OCHA also warned that current stocks of essential drugs will run out by the end of this month. There is already a shortage of hygiene kits and soap in all camps housing some 200,000 of the uprooted, it added.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said today that the portion of the Action Plan dedicated to health needs is only 11 per cent funded.
There is a high risk of communicable disease outbreaks due to overcrowding, contaminated water, poor sanitation and inadequate health care provision, among other factors, WHO said, cautioning that a funding shortfall will impede abilities to protect people from disaster.

This is a tragic situation and I hope and pray the Red Cross /Red Crescent and the UN save the situation worsening.