Pakistan has increased the official death toll from the devastating earthquake that hit the north of the country a month ago to 87,350, with nearly 100,000 injured, the United Nations said on Tuesday.
U.N. spokeswoman Amanda Pitt said the figures were provided by the Federal Relief Commission, the government body coordinating a massive aid effort.
The October 8 earthquake devastated wide areas of Pakistani Kashmir and North West Frontier Province. More than 1,300 people were killed in Indian Kashmir.
The tremor (of magnitude 7.4 on the Richter scale) which lasted for 6 minutes caused widespread death and destruction to property and communication network.
An estimated three million people are homeless after the earthquake. UN officials have warned that the death toll may rise further as winter approaches. Subzero temperatures will start being felt soon in some areas, they said.
Rescue teams, hampered by landslides that block mountain roads, have yet to reach some villages in the 25,000-square-kilometer, or 10,000-square-mile, region.
As many as 40,000 people in higher areas have not even received help, Jan Egeland, the UN’s top relief envoy, said.
‘This is the race against the clock that we’ve been talking about for some time,’ Egeland said. People in Kashmir will ‘freeze to death if they don’t get assistance in weeks.’
About 334,000 tents have been delivered to the disaster area, with 322,000 more expected.
The World Bank and the Asian Development Bank also estimate that the quake damaged 3,837 kilometers, or 2,385 miles, of roads and destroyed 7,197 educational institutions in Pakistan.
The UN says it needs more funds for supplies and to pay for helicopters to ferry aid to survivors in areas still cut off by road. UN agencies have received $84 million out of $133 million pledged, Egeland said, though that is less than 20 percent of the $550 million the UN sought for emergency relief.
Pakistan’s president, General Pervez Musharraf, has protested the world did not respond as generously in providing funds to Pakistan for earthquake relief as it did during the Southeast Asian tsunami, which left about 230,000 dead in December last year
Meanwhile, hundreds of survivors living in camps in Pakistani-administered Kashmir have acute diarrhoea, World Health Organization officials said this week.
‘In one camp we visited yesterday there were 55 cases of diarrhoea and there are so many spontaneous camps that we believe there are hundreds of others,’ WHO worker Rachel Levy told the AFP news agency in Muzaffarabad.
Doctors are investigating whether the outbreak has been caused by cholera.
The UN has said 350,000 people urgently need shelter before the onset of winter and medical aid is still to reach many others living in remote areas.
India and Pakistan have struck a deal to open five points along the heavily militarised LoC to help earthquake victims, but procedural difficulties are slowing things down.
On Wednesday, a second crossing opened on the Line of Control (LoC) that divides disputed Kashmir between India and Pakistan. But Kashmiri residents are still unable to cross the LoC to help relatives and loved ones on the other side.
U.N. spokeswoman Amanda Pitt said the figures were provided by the Federal Relief Commission, the government body coordinating a massive aid effort.
The October 8 earthquake devastated wide areas of Pakistani Kashmir and North West Frontier Province. More than 1,300 people were killed in Indian Kashmir.
The tremor (of magnitude 7.4 on the Richter scale) which lasted for 6 minutes caused widespread death and destruction to property and communication network.
An estimated three million people are homeless after the earthquake. UN officials have warned that the death toll may rise further as winter approaches. Subzero temperatures will start being felt soon in some areas, they said.
Rescue teams, hampered by landslides that block mountain roads, have yet to reach some villages in the 25,000-square-kilometer, or 10,000-square-mile, region.
As many as 40,000 people in higher areas have not even received help, Jan Egeland, the UN’s top relief envoy, said.
‘This is the race against the clock that we’ve been talking about for some time,’ Egeland said. People in Kashmir will ‘freeze to death if they don’t get assistance in weeks.’
About 334,000 tents have been delivered to the disaster area, with 322,000 more expected.
The World Bank and the Asian Development Bank also estimate that the quake damaged 3,837 kilometers, or 2,385 miles, of roads and destroyed 7,197 educational institutions in Pakistan.
The UN says it needs more funds for supplies and to pay for helicopters to ferry aid to survivors in areas still cut off by road. UN agencies have received $84 million out of $133 million pledged, Egeland said, though that is less than 20 percent of the $550 million the UN sought for emergency relief.
Pakistan’s president, General Pervez Musharraf, has protested the world did not respond as generously in providing funds to Pakistan for earthquake relief as it did during the Southeast Asian tsunami, which left about 230,000 dead in December last year
Meanwhile, hundreds of survivors living in camps in Pakistani-administered Kashmir have acute diarrhoea, World Health Organization officials said this week.
‘In one camp we visited yesterday there were 55 cases of diarrhoea and there are so many spontaneous camps that we believe there are hundreds of others,’ WHO worker Rachel Levy told the AFP news agency in Muzaffarabad.
Doctors are investigating whether the outbreak has been caused by cholera.
The UN has said 350,000 people urgently need shelter before the onset of winter and medical aid is still to reach many others living in remote areas.
India and Pakistan have struck a deal to open five points along the heavily militarised LoC to help earthquake victims, but procedural difficulties are slowing things down.
On Wednesday, a second crossing opened on the Line of Control (LoC) that divides disputed Kashmir between India and Pakistan. But Kashmiri residents are still unable to cross the LoC to help relatives and loved ones on the other side.
