Experts to decide repatriation of displaced people: Baig

Displaced people upload relief supplies from an army helicopter in the Aliabad area of Hunza District. PHOTO: GETTY/FILE

GILGIT: The Gilgit-Baltistan government has said that it will seek experts’ opinion on the repatriation of thousands of people displaced by the Attabad artificial lake to their homes.

The lake was formed on January 4 when a massive landslide blocked the flow of the Hunza river, submerging villages upstream and damaging the strategic Karakoram Highway (KKH).

“The decision to evacuate people from vulnerable villages downstream was taken on the advice of experts and now their repatriation will also be done on their advice,” Wazir Baig, Speaker of the Gilgit-Baltistan Assembly, told The Express Tribune on Friday.

“It has been decided in the council that a decision about whether or not to repatriate the displaced people to their homes will be taken only after getting the nod from experts,” he added.

Baig said vulnerable villages were vacated on the advice of experts, though the government still believes the lake will not bursts its banks.

The Gilgit-Baltistan government earlier said that it had invited national and international experts to seek their opinion on the “landslide lake.” The experts asked the government to evacuate people from downstream villages for fear of flooding. Thousands of villagers were then shifted to temporary camps set up on higher ground.

“They (experts) believed that the lake might burst its banks, therefore we have now left the matter to them to decide about the fate of displaced people,” he said of experts whose recommendation led to the displacement of more 13,000 people from dozens of villages and hamlets downstream.

Wazir Baig said people were insisting on going back to their villages because it was the harvest season in the region where people depend on agriculture for their livelihood.

Published in the Express Tribune, June 12^th, 2010.