Pakistan urges UN to take note of 'worst humanitarian crisis' in Afghanistan

Ambassador Munir Akram also cautions UNGA about the need to halt the growing global arms race

Pakistan has urged the United Nations to take note of the urgent and critical situation in Afghanistan facing one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world as the warn-torn country's assets abroad remain frozen.

"150 million people have been pushed back into extreme poverty, over 40 countries are facing debt distress and over 20 countries are facing food insecurity and millions of people in conflict zones in Africa and Afghanistan face starvation and massive fatalities," Ambassador Munir Akram told the UN General Assembly on Wednesday.

“These are urgent and critical situations for the peoples involved and the United Nations must display the urgency and the empathy that is required to address the suffering which we are seeing all across the world, in particular, across the developing world,” he added.

Also read: Desperate Afghans queue for free bread as poverty crisis deepens

Underscoring the need to generate the financing to enable the developing countries to recover from the pandemic and its reversal, he pointed out that the richer countries have injected $17 trillion into their economies to revive and restore the damage, but the developing countries have not been able to access more than $100 billion in additional financing for recovery.

Referring to the Covid-19 pandemic, the reversal by a decade or more of the progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and the existential threat of climate change, the Pakistani envoy pointed out that inequality was one common factor in all three dimensions,

Arms race

“We are witnessing a world today where global tensions, including between major powers, have revived. New and old conflicts abound: a new arms race is underway,” the ambassador said.

Also read: With war over, economic crisis puts lives of millions of Afghans in jeopardy

The consensus on disarmament has eroded, new military alliances are being formed in various parts of the world, with the UN largely absent, he noted.

“We cannot ignore the global and multi-dimensional threats to international peace and security today and live only in hope,” Ambassador Akram added.

“A stronger United Nations is necessary not only to debate and discuss the issues but to translate the conscience of humanity, the words which are spoken in these halls into concrete decisions and actions,” he also said.