Authorities in Pakistan are attempting to prevent their largest lake from overflowing after a failed attempt to drain it.
After days of record monsoon rainfall, the water levels in Manchar Lake in the southwestern Sindh province had risen to dangerously high levels.
The breaching attempt displaced as many as 100,000 people from their homes.
Monday, however, the province’s irrigation minister told Reuters that the lake’s water level had “not decreased.”
Sindh region provides fifty percent of the nation’s food, raising fears that many would face severe food shortages in a country already experiencing an economic crisis.
At least 1,314 people, including 458 children, have been killed by floods in Pakistan, according to Pakistan’s National Disaster Management Agency.
According to estimates, the floods have inflicted at least $10 billion (£8.5 billion) in damage.
Sunday, after the lake had swamped two small villages, officials breached its banks to prevent the lake from overflowing and flooding more heavily populated regions.
However, the relocation had the potential to harm approximately 400 settlements, leaving 135,000 people without a place to live. Officials instructed the people to flee this weekend.
Monday, however, officials reported that the lake’s water levels remained dangerously high.
Jam Khan Shoro, the provincial minister for irrigation, told Reuters that water levels had not decreased, but he would comment on whether additional efforts will be made to relieve the river’s swollen banks.
Pakistan is experiencing one of its biggest climate-induced natural disasters in years, as record heavy rainfall and melting glaciers in the country’s northern mountains have triggered devastating floods and inundated about one-third of its territory.
In the meantime, the UN children’s agency Unicef reported that the lack of potable water in Pakistan increased the likelihood of disease-related deaths among children.
The calamity has also brought to light the obvious inequality between the countries that contribute the most to climate change and those that face the brunt of its effects.
Pakistan contributes less than one percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, but its topography makes it highly susceptible to climate change.
