Pakistan's Deadly Floods

Asia Society Bernard Schwartz Fellow Hassan Abbas recently returned from Pakistan's flooded areas and said "this is the most serious disaster that Pakistan has seen."

He made the comments in a recent interview with Bloomberg Radio. "I was in the Pakistan for the last month,  I returned about three days ago, and I had a chance to go to the Northwest frontier province... and it was very painful to see. If you are on the road, you would see people on the side of those roads, practically showing their small kids who are dying of hunger and a dying because a lack of medicine. The flood situation is not restricted to any one province... so it is having a serious impact throughout the country."

Hassan went on to explain, "the only comparison that can be drawn was basically in 1969-70, when in East Pakistan, which is now Bangladesh, there were huge floods where about 300,000 people lost their lives, and that was one reason East Pakistan drifted away from West Pakistan because the government of the day had completely failed to rescue people and rehabilitate them... This crisis for this huge flood and catastrophe led to the independence of East Pakistan... That is not a good comparison but this what has happened in Pakistan's history."

Hear the complete interview or for more information, see Asia Society's Resources on Pakistan.