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Haiti quake survivors cry for help as death toll nears 2,000
Survivors of the earthquake that killed at least 1,941 people in Haiti clamored for food, shelter and medical care on Tuesday as search and rescue efforts resumed after a tropical storm lashed the Caribbean nation with rain, causing dangerous flooding.
Quake damage to several major hospitals hampered humanitarian efforts, and doctors in makeshift tents outside battled to save the lives of the many injured, including young children and the elderly. But they could not help them all, Reuters reported.
“There weren’t enough doctors and now she’s dead,” said Lanette Nuel, sitting listlessly next to her daughter’s body outside the main hospital of Les Cayes, one of the towns worst hit by both the tremor and the storm’s heavy rains and winds.
The 26-year-old deceased woman, herself a mother of two, had been crushed by debris during the magnitude 7.2 quake. Now she lay under a white sheet on the floor.
“We came in yesterday afternoon, she died this morning. I can’t do anything,” her mother said.
Saturday’s quake knocked down tens of thousands of buildings in the poorest country in the Americas, which is still recovering from a temblor 11 years ago that killed over 200,000 people. Aside from the dead, the latest quake also injured at least 9,915, with many people still missing or under the rubble, the civil protection service said on Tuesday afternoon, Reuters reported.
Relief efforts were already complicated due to political turmoil and difficult road access from the capital to the south due to gang control of key points. Flash flooding and landslides in the wake of Tropical Storm Grace, which by Tuesday afternoon had continued on past Jamaica, exacerbated the situation.
“Countless Haitian families who have lost everything due to the earthquake are now living literally with their feet in the water due to the flooding,” said Bruno Maes, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) representative in the country.
“Right now, about half a million Haitian children have limited or no access to shelter, safe water, healthcare and nutrition.”
The United Nations said it had allocated $8 million in emergency funds to provide relief for affected people, Reuters reported.
Latin America countries including Venezuela, Chile, Mexico, Panama, Colombia and the neighboring Dominican Republic sent food, medicine and supplies. The United States also dispatched supplies and search and rescue teams.
Although criminal gangs have been blocking access roads for months, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Human Affairs said “successful negotiations” had made it possible for a convoy to reach Les Cayes.
The hospital in Les Cayes, about 150 km west of the capital Port-au-Prince, was even more overwhelmed on Tuesday than before as patients who had been camping outside moved indoors to escape the tropical storm.
Director Peterson Gede said medics were doing the best they could. “We couldn’t handle all the patients,” he said. “And we have been receiving supplies, but it’s not enough.”
At a tent city in Les Cayes containing many children and babies, over a hundred people scrambled to repair makeshift coverings made of wooden poles and tarps that were destroyed by Grace overnight. Some took cover under plastic sheets.
Mathieu Jameson, deputy head of the committee formed by the tent city residents, said hundreds of people there were in urgent need of food, shelter and medical care.
“We don’t have a doctor. We don’t have food. Every morning more people are arriving. We have no bathroom, no place to sleep. We need food, we need more umbrellas,” said Jameson, adding the tent city was still waiting for government aid.
Haiti’s latest natural disaster comes just over a month after the country was plunged into political turmoil by the July 7 assassination of President Jovenel Moise.
U.S. national security adviser Jake Sullivan said on Tuesday it was too early to gauge the impact of the quake on Haiti’s political process and that the United States, the country’s main donor, had no current plans to deploy its military there.
Rescue workers have been digging alongside residents through the rubble in a bid to reach survivors.
On Tuesday morning 16 people were recovered alive alongside nine dead, Haitian civil protection authorities said.
But hopes were fading, and a smell of dust and decomposing bodies permeated the air, Reuters reported.
“We came from all over to help: from the north, from Port-au Prince, from everywhere,” said Maria Fleurant, a firefighter from northern Haiti.
Prime Minister Ariel Henry, who was sworn in less then a month ago after Moise’s assassination, vowed to disburse humanitarian aid better than in the wake of the 2010 quake.
Though billions of dollars in aid poured into Haiti after that quake and Hurricane Matthew in 2016, many Haitians say they saw scant benefits from the uncoordinated efforts: government bodies remained weak, amid persistent shortages of food and basic goods.
“The earthquake is a great misfortune that happens to us in the middle of the hurricane season,” Henry told reporters. He said the government would not repeat “the same things” done in 2010.
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Pakistan president claims situation in Afghanistan is ‘similar to or worse than pre-9/11’’
Pakistan’s President Asif Ali Zardari has warned that the presence of militant groups in the region poses risks to global peace, and repeated Islamabad’s concerns regarding what it describes as the activities of “terrorist organisations operating from Afghanistan.”
Zardari made the remarks in a statement issued Sunday, as he thanked world leaders for expressing solidarity with Pakistan following the recent attack on an imambargah in Islamabad, which left dozens dead and many others wounded. The incident was claimed by Daesh militant group.
According to the statement from the President’s Secretariat, Zardari said Pakistan remains committed to combating terrorism and stressed that no single country can address the threat alone.
“Pakistan has long maintained that terrorism cannot be confronted by a single country in isolation,” he was quoted as saying.
Citing Pakistan’s experience, he said in the statement that whenever “terrorist groups are allowed space, facilitation or impunity beyond national borders, the consequences are borne by innocent civilians all over the world.”
Zardari further claimed that the situation in Afghanistan under the Islamic Emirate authorities has created conditions “similar to or worse than pre-9/11,” and said this has influenced security developments across the region. IEA has repeatedly rejected such allegations, insisting that Afghan soil is not used against any country.
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Fazlur Rehman: Afghanistan’s economic situation is better than Pakistan’s
Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the leader of Pakistan’s Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI-F), has said that Afghanistan’s economic situation has become better than Pakistan’s, as Pakistan faces deepening financial hardship and increasing emigration.
Speaking at a gathering in Rawalpindi, Fazlur Rehman warned that business activity in Pakistan is collapsing and that many Pakistanis are leaving the country in search of stability. He sharply criticized Islamabad’s policies toward Afghanistan, describing them as “complete failures.”
Addressing Pakistan’s repeated claims that militants enter from Afghan territory, he said: “Authorities say terrorists are coming from there. If they are coming, stop them. If they are coming, eliminate them. The Afghan government has never objected to your actions.”
He also rejected the logic behind these allegations, pointing to the closure of key crossings between the two countries: “When not even a single pomegranate can enter Pakistan from Afghanistan today, how can militants enter?”
Fazlur Rehman argued that Pakistan’s foreign policy is shaped not by the civilian government, but by the military establishment: “One general comes and says we will negotiate; another comes and says we will wage war.”
Pakistani officials have long claimed that attacks inside Pakistan are planned from Afghan soil. The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has consistently denied this, saying Afghanistan cannot be blamed for Pakistan’s internal security failures.
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Tajik foreign minister urges international community to help Afghanistan address its challenges
Tajikistan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Sirodjiddin Mukhriddin, has called on the international community to step up assistance for Afghanistan as the country continues to face challenges.
Speaking at a press conference, Mukhriddin said Tajikistan and Afghanistan maintain active coordination between their law enforcement agencies to prevent security incidents along their shared border. He noted that this cooperation remains essential, as the frequency of armed attacks and criminal activity in border regions has increased in recent months.
He said that Afghan authorities had assured Tajikistan they would take necessary measures to stop further incidents and would conduct thorough investigations into any violations.
Mukhriddin emphasized that Tajikistan supports constructive international engagement aimed at improving Afghanistan’s socio-economic conditions. He highlighted that Tajikistan has provided more than 6,000 tons of humanitarian aid to Afghanistan, including food and essential supplies delivered in 2025 to assist communities affected by devastating earthquakes.
The minister also pointed to growing economic cooperation between the two neighbors. Tajikistan has reopened border markets and continues to supply electricity to Afghanistan.
Tajikistan and Afghanistan share a border of more than 1,300 kilometers—over 1,100 km of which consists of waterways and about 190 km of land boundaries.
Meanwhile, Zafar Samad Director of the Drug Control Agency under the President of the Republic of Tajikistan, has said that last year, 17 incidents of clashes happened with drug smugglers along the border with Afghanistan. As a result, two Tajik forces and 10 Afghan nationals have been killed, he added.
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