Displaced Family with few possesssions

Authorities in Pakistan say they are mobilizing to receive as many as half a million people newly displaced by fighting in and around the Swat Valley.The army said its “full-scale” assault had killed more than 170 militants in 24 hours, with the loss of 10 troops.  With Pakistani jets and helicopters pounding the Swat Valley and neighboring districts, the UN says the area threatens to become the scene of one of the world’s biggest displacement crises.

Sitara Imran, minister for social welfare in North West Frontier Province, called the exodus

“one of the huge displacements, internal displacements in the world”.

“We are preparing ourselves with the help of the federal government, we asked international donors,” she told the BBC’s News hour programme.

She said all her department’s doctors and social welfare staff had been mobilized and that holidays had been suspended as they worked to prepare for the influx.

“The whole Swat [population] is coming out from [the Swat Valley] so, naturally, it is a very difficult and complex situation,” she said.

The BBC’s Barbara Plett reports from a refugee registration centre in the area that some people left behind almost everything they owned, so fearful for their lives they did not even take time to lock the door.

Pakistani military spokesman Gen Athar Abbas said troops had killed 143 rebels in Swat, 25 in Lower Dir and six in Buner, losing seven soldiers in Swat and three in Lower Dir.

Militants were “on the run and trying to block the exodus of civilians from the area“, he said.

These internally displaced people are a challenge for the government and for the welfare organizations. Some NGOs like Khidmat foundation by Jamat-e-Islami were the first to reach out and establish the camps but still no other NGO or organization has shown any serious effort.

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According to media news, the well-off Tarakai family of Swabi has solely accommodated over 6,000 members of around 1,200 families of Buner and other affected towns after they left their homes. The Tarakai House, sprawling over hundreds of Kanals, has been vacated by the family — which has moved to Islamabad — to accommodate those who have fled Buner, Swat and Dir. Tents have been erected on the spacious lawns and gardens of the house to host the families who could not get any of the innumerable rooms in the building. Those wishing to support the affected people can approach Wilayat Tarakai on his cell phone numbers: 0300-5006160 and 0333-9858800.

I request all to come forward to help ou r brothers and sisters who are in time of distress these days. I  requests people throughout the world to help out the dislocated people of Swat by giving donations to the Edhi foundation, Al Khidmat Foundation or any other NGO of their choice which is working in that area.