Widespread flooding as the result of Monsoon rains has resulted in the deaths of dozens of people across Pakistan, India, and Afghanistan over the past few days, and the torrential rain storms have ended up displacing hundreds of thousands of people from their homes.
Many officials have reported that at least 40 people have been found dead due to the landslides and flooding all over Northern India, with many others still reported as missing. Additionally, many hundreds more have been kicked out of their homes or were forced to evacuate by search and rescue teams.
As reported from Pakistan, 37 individuals were killed in the most recent series of floods, and since back in mid-June, local authorities have issued a report stating that 820 have died in the storms and over 320,000 homes and residences have been destroyed or damaged.
Regarding Afghanistan, flash flooding of the same type has resulted in the deaths of at least 95 people, as reported by officials, and has injured hundreds of others. Just like the other locations, thousands of residences were reportedly destroyed.
“Winter is arriving soon and these affected families that include women and children do not have shelter to live under. All their agricultural farms and orchards have either been completely destroyed or their harvest has been damaged,” expressed Deputy Minister of Disaster Management Mawlawi Sharafuddin Muslim to CNN. “If these people are not helped to get back to normalcy, their situation will definitely get worse in the coming weeks and months.”
Muslim sounded the call for an increased level of aid from various international organizations such as the United Nations for more emergency relief, but due to the extremely antagonistic relationship between the Taliban and the international community, it is still unclear just how closely such groups would be willing to work with the official from Afghan.
The Taliban once again managed to take control of the country just last year after a period of over twenty years long at war with the U.S.-led NATO coalition, and many international observers have long expressed extreme concern that the government has once again fallen into a role that provides a safe haven for Al Qaeda and many other extremely radical Islamist terrorist groups. Earlier this past month, Osama Bin Laden’s mentor and successor as leader of the infamous group behind the 9/11 terror attacks, Ayman Al-Zawahiri, was taken out by a targeted drone strike from the U.S. while in the Afghan capital city of Kabul, at the home of another extremely high ranking official within the Taliban.
Normally, the season for monsoons in South Asia spans a period of June to September, with the peak levels of rainfall spiking in July and August.