UN calls for quake rebuilding moot
By Our Diplomatic Correspondent

ISLAMABAD—A conference of rich countries will take place in Geneva next week to assess Pakistan’s needs for rebuilding its earthquake-devastated north, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Tasnim Aslam said on Monday.
The conference called by the United Nations would be held on October 24, she told a weekly news conference. “We are grateful to the international community for their response. It reinforces our faith in human family,” she said.
Assessment of the damage caused by October 8 earthquake that devastated vast areas in Pakistani Kashmir and the neighboring parts of the North West Frontier Province was still underway. But Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said this week the quake caused damage of around $5 billion. The official death toll is nearly 40,000 and is expected to rise substantially as more remote areas are reached.
The UN’s Chief Emergency Relief Coordinator, Jan Egeland, said this week several hundreds of millions of dollars were needed for “just saving lives and keeping people alive” with the bitter winter approaching in mountainous Kashmir.
So far more than $500 million has been pledged from around the world, but development officials said they have started planning for a much larger long-term appeal.
The United Nations has scheduled an international conference next week on aid to earthquake-hit Pakistan, its humanitarian arm said Monday. Elisabeth Byrs, a spokeswoman for the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), told newsmen the October 24 meeting was expected to bring together ministers from Pakistan and donor countries, plus international aid agencies and other relief groups.
Byrs said OCHA is hoping that donor countries will transform their promised help into solid support, as Pakistan reels in the aftermath of the 7.6 magnitude quake which struck on October 8. OCHA organised a similar conference in January to take stock of relief efforts after the Indian Ocean tsunami and drum up more aid for affected countries.
The UN has so far received six million dollars of the 272 million dollars it appealed for after the earthquake, while donors have pledged another 44 million dollars. Most of the aid has been in kind — ranging from food supplies to helicopter flight hours.
The UN figure does not include all the direct aid to Pakistan offered by donor countries. Byrs said the UN would likely increase its appeal by another 40 million dollars in coming weeks.
The earthquake is estimated to have left more than 53,000 dead, tens of thousands injured and 2.5 million homeless in Pakistan alone. Many survivors are in desperate need, facing tough winter weather.
The UN also estimates that billions of dollars will be needed for a massive reconstruction effort lasting over a decade. Although neighbouring India was also affected, next week’s UN conference will focus on Pakistan because New Delhi has not asked for foreign aid.
Agencies add: The United Nations is sending more helicopters to northern part of country to help ferry supplies to survivors of the biggest earthquake in a century after relief efforts were stalled by bad weather and damaged roads. The UN World Food Program’s operation to airlift food to victims in remote areas was halted yesterday as rains and poor visibility prevented helicopters from taking off. Once the skies clear more helicopters will be needed to ferry supplies to survivors of the quake that left 39,400 people dead.
“We are bringing in additional helicopters,” Trevor Rowe, WFP spokesman said in live comments aired today on British Broadcasting Corp. television. Nine days after the 7.6 magnitude quake struck there are still villages that haven’t been reached, the BBC reported, citing rescue officials and local people in northern Pakistan, the world’s most mountainous region. Relief workers have resorted to donkeys because the rains have washed the roads out again and are using small boats to cross rivers.
“The immediate need for shelter from the elements is becoming ever more critical,” the International Organization for Migration, an aid group working in Pakistan, said in a statement. “Survivors continue to live outdoors in freezing temperatures and constant rainfall”. Relief agencies are shifting their focus from finding survivors amid the rubble to bringing aid to those made homeless by the quake, UN relief officials have said.