Daily brief: Aid organizations face funding emergency in Pakistan

Dire conditions

Four major Western aid agencies — Oxfam, Save the Children, Care, and Acted — have cautioned that if they do not receive more funds soon, they may have to curtail operations helping some 5 million people impacted by flooding this year in the province of Sindh (BBC, Tel, AP, AFP, Reuters). The agencies also warned that a failure to adequately help the more than 9 million people affected by the floods could result in an "unimaginable catastrophe." And the Telegraph looks at why aid organizations are having so much trouble raising money (Tel).

Pakistani police have reportedly arrested 11 suspects in the killing of three Hindus in Sindh Monday, after the Hindu community in Shikarpur district declared a strike until the men’s killers were brought to justice (ET, ET). And a study by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has found that Pakistani textbooks discriminate against Hindus and other religious minorities, while many teachers regard non-Muslims as "enemies of Islam" (AP, ET).

In a meeting with visiting U.S. Congressman Michael McCaul (R-TX), Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari called the Haqqani Network "snakes" and said he would work with the United States to "eradicate them" (AP). The statement comes a day after an anonymous U.S. official told Reuters that, "A spectacular raid or a set of spectacular mis-steps" in Afghanistan by a Pakistan-based group could seriously damage the U.S-Pakistan relationship (Reuters). And Pakistani authorities say that they have captured a Swat Valley Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) member in the Mardan district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province (ET).

Four stories round out the news: Pakistani opposition politician Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) has announced that it will form an "anti-corruption cell" to investigate the assets of the country’s leading politicians (ET). Indian and Pakistani officials met in the Maldives Tuesday ahead of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) summit this week, while Indian Foreign Minister SM Krishna told journalists that the "trust deficit" with Pakistan is growing smaller (Dawn, BBC, Dawn). And former Pakistani cricket captain Salman Butt has filed an appeal in a British court against his conviction last week for match-fixing (BBC).

Friendly fire

An Afghan soldier standing watch at a base in Uruzgan province opened fire on his colleagues Tuesday with an automatic rifle and grenade launcher, seriously wounding three Australian soldiers and two Afghans (AP, AFP, SMH). The Afghan soldiers on the base have been disarmed and confined to barracks, while the soldier responsible for the attack fled in an Afghan army vehicle (Guardian). 

An Afghan official in Paktika province claimed that Afghan forces with U.S. air support killed at least 60 militants Tuesday night after the fighters tried to attack Afghan and NATO bases in the area (AP, Reuters, BBC). And an Afghan policeman was killed Tuesday in the southern province of Zabul when Taliban forces attacked his checkpoint (Tolo).

Looking back

Tolo News this weekend reflected on the many ways Kabul has changed in the past 30 years, looking at growth and pollution as well as war and conflict (Tolo). Experts blame the explosion of growth and lack of infrastructure for some of the pollution now choking the city.

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