Fresh flooding sent a million people fleeing from their homes in Pakistan's south in the past two days, the UN said today, as officials evacuated a town threatened by the swollen Indus.
While floodwaters are beginning to recede across most of the country as the water flows downstream, high tides in the Arabian Sea meant they still posed a threat to towns in Sindh province such as Thatta, 70km east of Karachi.
"Concern continues to be the south," UN spokeswoman Stacey Winston told a news conference. "In the last 48 hours nearly one million people have been displaced," she said. The UN earlier said the floods had forced about six million people from their homes since they started a month ago.
The floods have killed almost 1,600 people and fears are growing that more could die if epidemics break out among people facing a lack of fresh food and clean water.
"There was another breach last night which is very close to Thatta and the evacuation has been ordered for the whole city," said Riaz Ahmed Soomro, relief commissioner in Sindh.
Many people from outlying areas had taken refuge in Thatta, which normally has a population of about 300,000, and now had to move again, Mr Soomro said. "Boats, buses, helicopters, everything is being used. The army, navy, everyone is involved in rescuing the people," he said.
The southern business hub of Karachi, Pakistan's largest city, is far away from the floodzone.
The floods, which began after torrential monsoon downpours over the upper Indus basin, are Pakistan's worst ever natural disaster in terms of the amount of damage and the number of people affected.
The floods have deepened Pakistanis' anger at the government of President Asif Ali Zardari, which was already perceived as ineffective and corrupt before the disaster hit and there are fears of social unrest.
In the United States, an ally which regards Pakistan as a frontline state in its war against the Taliban, concerns have grown that Islamist charities, some with links to militants, had increased their involvement in the flood relief effort, possibly exploiting anger at the government to gain recruits.
Even before the floods, Pakistan's economy was fragile and government officials are in Washington this week to ask the International Monetary Fund for help. Economic growth, forecast at 4.5 per cent this fiscal year, is now predicted at anything between zero to 3 per cent.
Finance minister Abdul Hafeez Shaikh said Pakistan wants to keep pursuing an $11 billion IMF loan program and demonstrate its resolve to make tough economic decisions, dismissing reports that Pakistan might abandon the programme.
The floods have damaged at least 3.2 million hectares (7.9 million acres) - about 14 per cent of the entire cultivated land - according to the United Nation's food agency. The total cost in crop damage is believed to be about $3 billion.
Food ministry officials said the government was likely to cancel plans to export two million tonnes of surplus to ensure there are no shortages. Up to 75,000 tonnes of stored grains have been washed away.
Reuters