UN to host donor meeting for quake victims

The UN will hold an international donor meeting next week to assess the rehabilitation and reconstruction needs of quake-devastated Pakistan. “The aim of this meeting is to obtain as comprehensive a picture as possible to determine the outstanding priority needs for international assistance,” UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said from Geneva on Wednesday. OCHA hopes donor countries will honour their promises to assist Pakistan as millions suffer in the aftermath of the 8 October quake that measured 7.6 on the Richter scale and left more than 40,000 dead and three million homeless. The meeting in Geneva next Wednesday (26 October) will be chaired by UN Emergency Relief Coordinator Jan Egeland and update donors on the situation on the ground, relief activities and the challenges ahead, Byrs said. But despite Egeland warning reconstruction of devastated areas would take years, the UN’s appeal for US $312 million in assistance has prompted only a lukewarm response, with just $38 million in contributions and $47 million in pledges received thus far. “We hope that member states will use this occasion to announce new pledges both in cash and in kind, through multilateral or bilateral channels,” Byrs said. Pakistan Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz this week said the quake had caused about $5 billion damage, devastating vast areas of Pakistan-administered Kashmir and the country’s North West Frontier Province (NWFP).