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When the ground was raised by last week’s earthquake in Afghanistan, Nahim Gul’s house of stone and clay collapsed on him.
He plunged through the rubble into the darkness before dawn, drowning in the dust while searching for his father and two sisters. He does not know how many hours of excavations passed before he caught their bodies under the rubble. They were dead.
Now, days after a magnitude 6 earthquake that devastated a remote southeastern region of Afghanistan and killed at least 1,150 people, authorities estimate, Gul sees devastation everywhere and insufficient aid. The quake also killed his granddaughter and nephew, who were crushed by the walls of their home.
The United Nations has put the death toll at 770, but warned it could rise further. Each would make Afghanistan the deadliest earthquake in two decades.
“I do not know what will happen to us or how we should resume our lives. “We have no money to rebuild.”Gul told the Associated Press on Sunday, with his bruised hands and injured shoulder.
It is a fear shared among thousands in impoverished villages where the earthquake fury has hit hardest, in Paktika and Khost provinces, along the rugged mountains that cross the country’s border with Pakistan.
Those who were barely scratching have lost everything. Many of them have not yet been visited by aid groups and authorities, who are struggling to reach the affected area on rugged roads, some made impassable by landslides and injuries.
Aware of its limitations, the cash Taliban have called for foreign aid and on Saturday called on Washington to melt billions of dollars into Afghanistan’s foreign exchange reserves. The United Nations and a number of international aid groups and countries have been mobilized to send aid.
China on Saturday pledged about $ 7.5 million in emergency humanitarian aid, joining nations including Iran, Pakistan, South Korea, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar in sending an aircraft with tents, towels, beds and other supplies needed for the area hit by the earthquake.
UN Deputy Special Representative Ramiz Alakbarov visited the hard-hit Paktika province on Saturday to assess the damage and distribute food, medicine and tents. UN helicopters and trucks loaded with bread, flour, rice and blankets have leaked into the affected areas.
“Yesterday’s visit reconfirmed me the extreme suffering of the people of Afghanistan and their extraordinary determination in the face of great disasters.”Alakbarov said, appealing for the repair of damaged water pipes, roads and communication lines in the area.
Without support, he added, Afghans “will continue to endure unnecessary and unimaginable hardship.”
But the relief effort remains unclear and limited due to funding and access restrictions. The Taliban, who took power last August from a government backed for 20 years by a US-led military coalition, appear overwhelmed by the logistical complexity of issues such as debris removal in what is emerging as a major capacity test. their to govern.
Villagers have dug up their dead loved ones with bare hands, buried them in mass graves and slept in the woods despite the rain. Nearly 800 families live abroad, according to the UN humanitarian co-ordinating organization OCHA.
Gul received a tent and blanket from a local charity in Gayan District, but he and his surviving relatives had to take care of themselves. Terrified as the earth still rumbles from aftershocks like the one on Friday that took five more lives, he said his children in Gayan refuse to go inside.
The quake was the latest disaster to shake Afghanistan, which is recovering from a severe economic crisis since the Taliban took control of the country as the US and its NATO allies withdrew their forces. Foreign aid – a pillar of Afghanistan’s economy for decades – virtually stopped overnight.
World governments rallied with sanctions, banned bank transfers and paralyzed trade, refusing to recognize the Taliban government. The Biden administration cut off Taliban access to $ 7 billion in foreign exchange reserves held in the United States.
While visiting the site of the disaster, incumbent Afghan Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi urged the White House to release funds “at a time when Afghanistan is under earthquake and flood control” and lift banking restrictions so that charities can provide more easily. help.
Western donors have refused long-term aid as they demand that the Taliban allow a more comprehensive rule and respect human rights. Former insurgents have resisted pressure, imposing restrictions on the freedoms of women and girls recalling their first time in power in the late 1990s.
Now, about half of the country’s 39 million people are facing life-threatening levels of food insecurity due to poverty. Most civil servants, including doctors, nurses and teachers, are not paid for months.
VOA writes that UN agencies and other remaining organizations have tried to keep Afghanistan off the brink of starvation with a humanitarian program that has fed millions and kept the medical system afloat. But with the delay of international donors, UN agencies face a $ 3 billion funding shortfall this year.
Kidnapped by war and impoverished long before the Taliban seized power, the remote areas hit by last Wednesday’s earthquake are particularly unequipped to deal with.
Some local businessmen have taken action. The Afghanistan Chamber of Commerce and Investments said Sunday it had raised more than $ 1.5 million for Pakitka and Khost provinces.
However, for those whose homes have been destroyed, help may not be enough.
“We have nothing left” tha Gul.
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