The UN has made a desperate appeal for help to save lives in the quake-hit areas of Pakistan, saying it would be forced to scale down its relief operations if it does not receive more cash urgently from the donor countries. A UN official told a news conference in Islamabad that an estimated 2.3 million people are in dire need for food.
UN Resident Co-ordinator Jan Vandermoortele said that his organisation is currently executing its relief operations by borrowing money, and that it would be forced to stop its efforts if the donors did not provide the money they had pledged at their October 26 conference in Geneva. Said he, "Thousands of homeless will die of malnutrition, hunger, and diseases if the aid is not provided within days."
It indeed is a grim picture of an impending disaster that can be easily prevented only if the wealthy nations, who never tire of talking about respect for human life and saying the world was never as rich as it today is, were to loosen their purse strings a little bit.
Unfortunately, their response to the suffering of millions of quake stricken people has been a lot less than satisfactory. A day before the donors were to meet in Geneva, an important international aid agency, Oxfam, had criticised Western governments for giving too little too late.
It had pointed out that governments of most rich countries, including the US, Germany, Italy and Japan had given less than one fifth of their "fair share", calculated according to their economic weight. There were others like France, which gave nothing at all.
The agency's Policy Director, Phil Bloomer, underlined the fact that "the logistical nightmare in Pakistan is bad enough without having to worry about funding shortfalls as well." The issue now is that even though the donors made pledges worth $580 million - which should be sufficient to meet the relief requirements as the UN says it needs $250 million immediately to continue its operations - but they have to make good on those pledges. It may surprise many but the usual donor practice is to deliver as little as around ten percent of the pledged monies.
That they have done on so many occasions in the past. But then the present situation is entirely different. For example, these donors did not deliver on what they promised to give Afghanistan for reconstruction work. Reconstruction can wait but not hunger and homelessness in the Himalayan mountainous regions where harsh winter conditions are approaching fast.
Action or lack of it at this point in time can make a difference between life and death for millions of the quake sufferers. It is time for the rich nations to live up to their rhetoric about civilised behaviour and respect for human life, and save millions of lives that are at peril. It would be inexcusable if so many lives were to perish simply because those who had the resources to do the needful did not do so.