The recent devastating floods in Pakistan confirmed the fears of climate experts and endorsed the country’s narrative of climate change being a major factor driving the catastrophe. Killing 1,569 people and displacing more than 33 million, it is a red alert that if course correction measures are not undertaken timely, the world would be headed towards a collective suicide.
Since the country began keeping detailed weather records in 1961, Pakistan experienced the most rains this year. According to Pakistan Meteorological Department, the provinces hit hardest by floods received up to eight times more rain than usual. According to a scientific report by researchers from World Weather Attribution, “The flooding occurred as a direct consequence of the extreme monsoon rainfall throughout the summer 2022 season exacerbated by shorter spikes of very heavy rain, particularly in August, hitting the provinces Sindh and Balochistan.” As the techniques of assessing climate change improve, scientists can assess with greater certainty how the changes induced by the earth’s population is affecting the weather patterns, raising the question of how nations should adapt given the new projections.
This year, Pakistan went straight from winter to summer, leaving out spring season, as the heatwaves hit the country, one after another. Resultantly, forest fires erupted, rampaging through the forest areas, destroying everything in their wake. The Glacial Lake Outburst Floods tripled with boulders coming down with angry meltdown from the glaciers. Besides all this and the recent floods, World Health Organisation has warned that Pakistan is looking at a second disaster if there is an outbreak of waterborne diseases. As had been feared, life-threatening diseases are now taking hold of the displaced communities, nearly 7.6 million people, who are living in temporary shelters at the relief sites or in open areas surrounded by stagnant water. Many parts of the country, especially the southern province of Sindh and parts of eastern Balochistan, including other hardest-hit areas are underwater and it is feared that it might take months for the water to recede.
Besides civil administration, Pakistan Armed Forces are also at the forefront to provide relief to the flood affected population. National Flood Response and Coordination Centre (NFRCC) forum has been established for the said purpose, which will ensure the rehabilitation of flood victims besides infrastructure and mitigating water-borne diseases. The NFRCC has declared 81 districts as ‘calamity-hit’, including 32 districts of Balochistan, six in Gilgit-Baltistan, 17 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, three in Punjab and 23 in Sindh.
Among the first-responders are also United Nations (UN) agencies besides cargo planes that have brought relief supplies and medicine from different countries. The UN agencies are coordinating logistics to transport relief items to the local authorities in the affected areas. UN Secretary-General, António Guterres, also paid a visit to Pakistan in a show of solidarity, and urged the international community for massive support in order to bolster the response against this climate catastrophe as developing countries pay the price for the intransigence of big emitters. “[We] have all seen media images of the extraordinary destruction. I can only imagine the power and ferocity of the water as it bore down on villages, roads, bridges and everything else in its path. It was clearly terrifying – a wall of water.” Mr. Guterres added, “No country deserves this fate, but particularly not countries like Pakistan that have done almost nothing to contribute to global warming.” He also pointed out, “This is collective suicide”, calling for an end to the “war with nature”. 
The bottom line is that climate change is increasingly becoming an additional factor that contributes to the frequency and strength of such events. The weather patterns depicted by the records show that South Asia’s monsoon is whipsawing between drier and wetter patterns, which is unfortunate for the agrarian countries who will have to deal with either parched or inundated fields. The countries nearer to the equator are more likely to experience such drastic changes and climate change vulnerabilities, therefore timely decisions and a collective response, both nationally and internationally, is critical to counter and protect against this new accelerated pace of change.

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