Imran Khan announces to hold international telethon to raise funds for flood victims

Former prime minister and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan announced on Saturday that he will hold an international charity telethon to raise funds for people affected by floods across the country.

"Our senior leadership met and we decided. I would do an international telethon to raise funds for flood affectees on Monday night," Khan said in a Twitter post.

The former premier added that "Imran Tigers," PTI's volunteer force, will be activated to help with the relief work.

He further shared that "command under Sania Nishtar will be set up to identify & coordinate funds allocation based on needs."

However, Khan clarified that his party's "Haqeeqi Azadi" movement - a term he uses to describe his campaign against the coalition government - will continue.

"Let me make clear that our movement for Haqeeqi Azadi will continue alongside our flood relief work."

PTI chairman's announcement comes hours after the party's general secretary Asad Umar said that Imran Khan will participate in a telethon to generate funds for the flood victims.

"Tomorrow Imran Khan will be holding a telethon to raise funds for flood relief efforts. Details will be announced later today," he tweeted earlier on Saturday.

Historic monsoon rains and flooding in the country have affected more than 30 million people over the last few weeks, the climate change minister Sherry Rehman said on Thursday, calling the situation a “climate-induced humanitarian disaster of epic proportions”.

The government has urged the international community to help with relief efforts as it struggles to cope with the aftermath of torrential rains that have triggered massive floods since last month, killing more than 900 people.

“33 million have been affected, in different ways; the final homeless figure is being assessed,” Climate Change Minister Sherry Rehman told Reuters in a text message.

Over 30m people affected by floods: govt

She added that Sindh, hardest hit in the last few days, had requested one million tents for affected people.

“South of Pakistan is inundated almost underwater...people are going to higher ground,” she said.

“Needs assessment is being done, we have to make UN’s international flash appeal; this is not the task of one country or one province, it is a climate-induced disaster,” she added.

Minister for Planning and Development Ahsan Iqbal separately told Reuters that 30 million people had been affected, a figure that would represent about 15% of the South Asian country’s population.

Rehabilitation of flood affectees: Govt to hold ‘donor conference’

UN agency Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in an update on Thursday that the monsoon rains had affected some 3 million people in Pakistan of which 184,000 have been displaced to relief camps across the country.

Funding and reconstruction efforts will be a challenge for cash-strapped Pakistan, which is having to cut spending to ensure the International Monetary Fund approves the release of much-needed bailout money.