A year after the earthquake, how are the conditions in Pakistan?
Conditions in northern Pakistan vary dramatically depending on where you are located. This past summer while I was working in Kashmir, I expected to see a certain level of advancement in recovery – mostly because I was comparing the ground situation to that of Mansehra, where I was based in December. However in Kashmir – especially very near the “Line of Control” – the people only received aid this past April. That is over six months after the initial earthquake! In larger cities like Muzaffarbad and Mansehra, there is still a large presence of international NGOs. However, it seemed to me that there was an increasing involvement by local Pakistani NGOs who are trying to move away from a model international dependency towards more self-sustainability. According to an article in the International Herald Tribune, the 7.6 earthquake killed 80,000 people and displaced 3 million. The paper reports that “Many of the 2,000 children who lost limbs, fingers or toes in the earthquake or its after
