PESHAWAR/QUETTA: The death toll from continuing rains in Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province has risen to 39, while another 54 people have been injured in various incidents, the KP Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) said on Friday.

The rains that began last Friday have caused damages to 2,391 houses in several districts across the province, according to the PDMA.

Khyber, Dir Lower and Upper, Chitral Upper and Lower, Swat, Shangla, Bajaur, Malakand, Karak and Tank districts have been declared the most affected by the downpours.

“As many as 23 children, eight men and eight women are among those died in rain related incidents during the last eight days,” the PDMA said in a statement on Friday.

The current spell of showers, which began on April 17, was likely to continue till April 21, the PDMA said this week.

The provincial government has released Rs110 million to be distributed among the affected families and dispatched aid, including tents, kitchen kits, blankets, hygiene kits, mosquito nets and mattresses, to the affected areas, according to the authority.

As the rains were expected to continue intermittently until April 21, the PDMA said it had already a letter to administration of all districts to remain alert and take precautionary measures.

In the southwestern Balochistan province, heavy rains have killed 15 people since Friday and triggered flash floods in several areas, according to provincial authorities.

Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfaraz Bugti said climate change had become a “challenge” for the provincial government.

“Current rains are unusual which were never reported in a thousand years,” he told reporters on Friday. “The government has been helping the masses with available resources and our teams have reached all districts to help the people affected by rains and floods.”

Pakistan has received heavy rains in the last three weeks that have triggered landslides and flash floods in several parts of the South Asian country.

The eastern province of Punjab has reported 21 lighting- and roof collapse-related deaths, while Balochistan, in the country’s southwest, reported 10 deaths as authorities declared a state of emergency following flash floods.

In 2022, downpours swelled rivers and at one point flooded a third of Pakistan, killing 1,739 people. The floods also caused $30 billion in damages, from which Pakistan is still trying to rebuild.

ISLAMABAD: Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti on Friday promised “good governance” and provision of maximum relief to public as his 14-member cabinet took oath in the southwestern Pakistani province, Pakistani state media reported.

The cabinet members were sworn in at a ceremony held at the Governor House in the provincial capital of Quetta, where Governor Malik Abdul Wali Kakar administered the oath to them.

The development came more than two months after Balochistan elected its representatives in the national election that was held on February 8, this year.

Bugti said the formation of the cabinet took time due to consultation with all coalition partners, the state-run APP news agency reported.

“Balochistan was facing many challenges, including terrorism,” he was quoted as saying in the report. “Providing maximum relief to the public and strengthening good governance were key priorities for the provincial government.”

Balochistan is the site of a long-running insurgency by separatist and religiously motivated militants, who have recently carried out a number of attacks in the region.

Gunmen this month killed nine people, who hailed from the eastern Punjab province, after abducting them from a bus on a highway near the Noshki district. The outlawed Balochistan Liberation Army claimed responsibility for the attack.

Although the government says it has quelled the insurgency, violence by groups demanding independence from the central government has persisted in the province.