World

Pakistan’s flooded southern Sindh province braced Sunday for a fresh deluge from swollen rivers in the north as the death toll from this year’s monsoon topped 1,000.

The mighty Indus River that courses through Pakistan’s second-most populous region is fed by dozens of mountain tributaries to the north, but many have burst their banks following record rains and glacier melt.

Officials warned torrents of water are expected to reach Sindh in the next few days, adding misery to millions already affected by the floods.

“Right now, Indus is in high flood,” said Aziz Soomro, the supervisor of Sukkur Barrage — a massive colonial-era construction that regulates the river’s flow and redirects water to a vast system of canals.

The annual monsoon is essential for irrigating crops and replenishing lakes and dams across the Indian subcontinent, but it also brings destruction.

Officials say this year’s monsoon flooding has affected more than 33 million people — one in seven Pakistanis — destroying or badly damaging nearly a million homes.

On Sunday, the country’s National Disaster Management Authority said the death toll from the monsoon rains had reached 1,033, with 119 killed in the previous 24 hours.

It said this year’s floods were comparable to 2010 — the worst on record — when over 2,000 people died and nearly a fifth of the country was under water.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who cancelled a trip to Britain to oversee relief operations, said he had never seen anything like it before.

“Village after village has been wiped out. Millions of houses have been destroyed. There has been immense destruction,” he said after flying over Sindh by helicopter.

Thousands of people living near flood-swollen rivers in Pakistan’s north were ordered to evacuate from danger zones, but army helicopters and rescuers are still plucking laggards to safety.

“People were informed around three or four o’clock in the morning to evacuate their houses,” rescue worker Umar Rafiq told AFP. 

“When the flood water hit the area we had to rescue children and women.”

Many rivers in the area — a picturesque tourist destination of rugged mountains and valleys — have burst their banks, demolishing scores of buildings including a 150-room hotel that crumbled into a raging torrent.

Guest house owner Nasir Khan, whose business was badly hit by the 2010 flooding, said he had lost everything.

“It has washed away the remaining part of the hotel,” he told AFP.

The flood-swollen rivers were also yielding unlikely riches.

Locals scrambled to snag thousands of valuable cedar, pine and oak logs that had likely been illegally harvested in the mountains but were being washed downstream.

– Climate change to blame –

Officials blame the devastation on human-driven climate change, saying Pakistan is unfairly bearing the consequences of irresponsible environmental practices elsewhere in the world.

Pakistan is eighth on NGO Germanwatch’s Global Climate Risk Index, a list of countries deemed most vulnerable to extreme weather caused by climate change.

Exacerbating the situation, corruption, poor planning and the flouting of local regulations mean thousands of buildings have been erected in areas prone to seasonal flooding.

The government has declared an emergency and mobilised the military to deal with what Climate Change Minister Sherry Rehman has called “a catastrophe of epic scale”.

In parts of Sindh, the only dry areas are the elevated roads and railroad tracks, alongside which tens of thousands of poor rural folk have taken shelter with their livestock.

Near Sukkur, a row of tents stretched for two kilometres, with people still arriving by boats loaded with wooden charpoy beds and pots and pans — the only possessions they could salvage.

“Water started rising in the river from yesterday, inundating all the villages and forcing us to flee,” labourer Wakeel Ahmed, 22, told AFP.

Sukkur Barrage supervisor Soomro told AFP every sluice gate was open to deal with a river flow of more than 600,000 cubic metres per second.

The flooding could not come at a worse time for Pakistan, where the economy is in free fall and the former prime minister Imran Khan was ousted by a parliamentary vote of no confidence in April.

While the capital Islamabad and adjoining twin garrison city of Rawalpindi have escaped the worst of the flooding, its effects were still being felt.

“Currently supplies are very limited,” said Muhammad Ismail, a produce shopkeeper in Rawalpindi.

“Tomatoes, peas, onions and other vegetables are not available due to the floods,” he told AFP, adding prices were also soaring.

Dutch police on Sunday said six people were killed and seven other people hurt after a truck ran off the top of a dike road and ploughed into revellers at a neighbourhood barbecue.

The accident happened around six pm (1600 GMT) on Saturday when the Spanish-registered lorry left the road in the village of Nieuw-Beijerland, 30 kilometres (18 miles) south of Rotterdam.

The victims were three women aged 28, 32 and 75, and three men aged 41, 50 and 62, all from the local area, police said. One of the injured was in a critical condition in hospital.

Police had first confirmed at least two dead after the vehicle drove into the crowded community barbecue, which Dutch news reports said was being hosted by an ice-skating club.

“We now have six people killed and seven injured, one seriously after yesterday’s accident,” police spokeswoman Mirjam Boers told AFP.

“We are still investigating what exactly happened,” she said.

Photographs from the scene identified the truck as belonging to the El Mosca company, based in Spain.

Boers confirmed the 46-year-old driver from Spain had been arrested “and was not under the influence of alcohol,” at the time of the accident.

“He was arrested for causing a fatal accident and serious bodily injury. His role in the incident is under investigation. For the time being, we are keeping all scenarios about the facts open,” police said in a statement.

– ‘Unimaginable sadness’ –

Dutch King Willem-Alexander and Queen Maxima said they were “shocked” by the tragedy.

“We are shocked and moved by the terrible accident in Nieuw-Beijerland last night in which so many people were killed. An unimaginable sadness within this close-knit community,” the king and queen said in an official message.

“The families affected are in our thoughts and we wish the injured strength on their way to the best possible recovery.”

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte also sent s condolences.

“Terrible news … my thoughts are with the victims and relatives of this terrible drama. I wish them a lot of strength,” Rutte said on Twitter.

Quoting witnesses, the Rijnmond regional broadcaster said the truck stopped for a moment at a T-junction on the narrow Zuidzijdsedijk dike, before taking off and ploughing into the revellers.

Three of the victims — a mother, son and daughter-in-law who was eight months pregnant — came from the same family, the broadcaster reported, quoting a local church announcement.

The incident has shaken the tight-knit community of the Nieuw-Beijerland region with police calling for more witnesses to help with the investigation.

“Due to the neighbourhood barbecue, many people were present during the incident,” police said.

Photographs from the scene on Saturday night showed several chairs scattered in the wake of the lorry.

Supporters of Argentine Vice President Cristina Kirchner — on trial for alleged corruption — gathered across the country on Saturday, with police using tear gas and water cannon in the capital Buenos Aires.

Kirchner, 69, is accused of fraudulently awarding public works contracts in her stronghold in Patagonia, and prosecutors have asked that she face 12 years in jail and a lifetime ban from politics.

Thousands responded to a social media campaign and gathered peacefully in town squares across Argentina, though in Buenos Aires some supporters breached police barricades to reach Kirchner’s home.

“There has been too much blood in Argentina for them to continue threatening those who think differently with gunfire, bullets, tear gas and pepper spray,” Kirchner told supporters.

The ex-president, who ruled from 2007 to 2015, called on her opponents “to stop competing among themselves” about who hates Peronists more, referencing the political movement she subscribes to, based on the ideas of former ruler Juan Peron.

“It is incredible the degree of cynicism and perversion of not assuming and taking charge of what they want: to exterminate Peronism,” she said.

Kirchner is the Senate president and enjoys parliamentary immunity.

Even if convicted — the verdict is expected at the end of the year — she would not go to prison unless her sentence was ratified by the country’s Supreme Court, or she loses her Senate seat at the next elections at the end of 2023.

Dutch police on Sunday raised the death toll to six with seven other people hurt after a horse-and-trailer truck ran off a dike road, ploughing into revellers.

The accident happened around six pm (1600 GMT) on Saturday when the Spanish-registered truck left the road on the narrow Zuidzijdsedijk, 30 kilometres (18 miles) south of Rotterdam.

Police had first confirmed at least two dead after the vehicle drove into a community barbecue, which Dutch news reports said was being hosted by an ice-skating club.

“We now have six people killed and seven injured, one seriously after yesterday’s accident,” police spokeswoman Mirjam Boers told AFP.

“We are still investigating what exactly happened,” she said.

Photographs from the scene identified the truck as belonging to the El Mosca company, based in Spain.

Boers confirmed the driver had been arrested “and was not under the influence of alcohol,” at the time of the accident.

Quoting witnesses, the Rijnmond regional broadcaster said the truck stopped for a moment at a T-junction on the dike, before taking off and ploughing into the revellers.

The incident has shocked the tight-knit community of the Nieuw-Beijerland region with police calling for more witnesses to help with the investigation.

Two United States warships sailed through the Taiwan Strait on Sunday, the American navy said, the first such transit since China staged unprecedented military drills around the island.

In a statement, the US Navy said the transit “demonstrates the United States’ commitment to a free and open Indo-Pacific.”

Tensions in the Taiwan Strait soared to their highest level in years this month after US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi visited Taipei. 

Beijing reacted furiously, staging days of air and sea exercises around Taiwan. Taipei condemned the drills and missile tests as preparation for an invasion.

Taiwan lives under constant threat of an invasion by China, which claims the self-ruled, democratic island as part of its territory to be seized one day — by force if necessary.

Washington diplomatically recognizes Beijing over Taipei, but maintains de facto relations with Taiwan and supports the island’s right to decide its own future.

The US Seventh Fleet said the pair of Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruisers — the USS Antietam and the USS Chancellorsville — conducted the “routine” transit on Sunday “through waters where high seas freedoms of navigation and overflight apply in accordance with international law.”

“These ships transited through a corridor in the Strait that is beyond the territorial sea of any coastal State,” a statement said. 

“The United States military flies, sails, and operates anywhere international law allows.”

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) said the US had “openly hyped up” the ships’ passage through the Strait.

“The PLA Eastern Theatre Command is following and warning the US vessels throughout their entire journey, and is aware of all movements,” spokesman Senior Colonel Shi Yi said.

“Troops in the (eastern) theatre remain on high alert and are prepared at all times to foil any provocations.”

Taiwan’s defense ministry confirmed a pair of warships sailed from north to south through the channel.

“During their southward journey through the Taiwan Strait, the military is fully monitoring relevant movements in our surrounding sea and airspace, and the situation is normal.”

– ‘Freedom of navigation’ –

The Seventh Fleet is based in Japan and is a core part of Washington’s navy presence in the Pacific.

The US and Western allies have increased “freedom of navigation” crossings by naval vessels of both the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea to reinforce the concept that those seas are international waterways, sparking anger from Beijing.

Washington has said its position on Taiwan remains unchanged and has accused China of threatening peace in the Taiwan Strait and using the visit by Pelosi as a pretext for military exercises.

China’s drills included firing multiple ballistic missiles into waters off Taiwan — some of the world’s busiest shipping routes — which was the first time Beijing has taken such a step since the mid-1990s.

Taiwan staged its own drills, simulating a defense against invasion and displaying its most advanced fighter jet in a rare nighttime demonstration.

Under President Xi Jinping, China’s tone on Taiwan has grown more aggressive, with increased military activity and more combative messaging in recent years.

Pakistan’s flooded southern Sindh province braced Sunday for a fresh deluge from swollen rivers in the north as the death toll from this year’s monsoon topped 1,000.

The mighty Indus River that courses through Pakistan’s second-most populous region is fed by dozens of mountain tributaries to the north, but many have burst their banks following record rains and glacier melt.

Officials warned torrents of water are expected to reach Sindh in the next few days, adding misery to millions already affected by the floods.

“Right now, Indus is in high flood,” said Aziz Soomro, the supervisor of a barrage that regulates the river’s flow near Sukkur.

The annual monsoon is essential for irrigating crops and replenishing lakes and dams across the Indian subcontinent, but it also brings destruction.

Officials say this year’s monsoon flooding has affected more than 33 million people — one in seven Pakistanis — destroying or badly damaging nearly a million homes.

On Sunday, the country’s National Disaster Management Authority said the death toll from the monsoon rains had reached 1,033, with 119 killed in the previous 24 hours.

It said this year’s floods are comparable to 2010 — the worst on record — when over 2,000 people died and nearly a fifth of the country was under water.

Thousands of people living near flood-swollen rivers in Pakistan’s north were ordered to evacuate from danger zones, but army helicopters and rescuers are still plucking laggards to safety.

“People were informed around three or four o’clock in the morning to evacuate their houses,” rescue worker Umar Rafiq told AFP. 

“When the flood water hit the area we had to rescue children and women.”

Many rivers in the area — a picturesque tourist destination of rugged mountains and valleys — have burst their banks, demolishing scores of buildings including a 150-room hotel that crumbled into a raging torrent.

Guest house owner Nasir Khan, whose business was badly hit by the 2010 flooding, said he had lost everything.

“It has washed away the remaining part of the hotel,” he told AFP.

– Climate change to blame –

Officials blame the devastation on human-driven climate change, saying Pakistan is unfairly bearing the consequences of irresponsible environmental practices elsewhere in the world.

Pakistan is eighth on NGO Germanwatch’s Global Climate Risk Index, a list of countries deemed most vulnerable to extreme weather caused by climate change.

Exacerbating the situation, corruption, poor planning and the flouting of local regulations mean thousands of buildings have been erected in areas prone to seasonal flooding.

The government has declared an emergency and mobilised the military to deal with what Climate Change Minister Sherry Rehman has called “a catastrophe of epic scale”.

In parts of Sindh, the only dry land are the elevated roads and rail tracks, alongside which tens of thousands of poor rural folk have taken shelter with their livestock.

Near Sukkur, a row of tents stretched for two kilometres, with people still arriving by boats loaded with wooden charpoy beds and pots and pans — the only possessions they could salvage.

“Water started rising in the river from yesterday, inundating all the villages and forcing us to flee,” labourer Wakeel Ahmed, 22, told AFP.

Barrage supervisor Soomro told AFP every sluice gate was open to deal with a river flow of more than 600,000 cubic metres per second.

The flooding could not come at a worse time for Pakistan, where the economy is in free fall and the former prime minister Imran Khan was ousted by a parliamentary vote of no confidence in April.

While the capital Islamabad and adjoining twin garrison city of Rawalpindi have escaped the worst of the flooding, its effects were still being felt.

“Currently supplies are very limited,” said Muhammad Ismail, a produce shopkeeper in Rawalpindi.

“Tomatoes, peas, onions and other vegetables are not available due to the floods,” he told AFP, adding prices were also soaring.