Pakistan's rich and possibly US Military 'diverted floods to save their land'

A senior Pakistan diplomat has accused "powerful" figures of diverting floodwaters into unprotected areas to save their own land.



Abdullah Hussain Haroon, Pakistan's representative to the UN, has called for an inquiry into a "handful" of cases where influential people took "advantage of these floods and saved themselves" in a disaster that has left more than 1,600 people dead.



Mr Haroon, one of a number of senior officials including a former prime minister who have made the allegations, called for a full judicial inquiry amid claims that unprotected villages had been swamped, forcing the inhabitants to abandon their homes.



Mr Haroon denied mismanagement of the relief effort, instead blaming a few people in powerful positions. "Over the years, one has seen with the lack of floods that those areas normally set aside for floods have come under irrigation of the powerful and the rich," Mr Haroon told the BBC.



"It is suggested in some areas, those to be protected allowed... levees to be burst on opposite sides to take the water away. If that is happening, the government should be inquiring and be answerable to its own people."



The controversy has surfaced in various parts of the country. Former prime minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali has alleged that water was diverted to submerge his lands in Balochistan province to protect an airbase he said the Americans were using near the town of Jacobabad. The authorities deny the claim. The US Embassy in Islamabad has denied that the American military uses the Shahbaz airbase.