Karachi/ Hyderabad:
Speakers of a seminar have highlighted the growing ecological and socio -economic challenges that are presented by the breakdown of the river Indus.
The seminar, entitled “Indus River: The Lifeline of Sindh threatened”, was organized by the National Trade Union Federation Pakistan (NTUF) and the youth organization, alternative at Karachi Press Club Friday. It coincided with the 28th international ‘Action Day for Rivers.’
Leading intellectual, public representatives and environmental activists spoke at the seminar where they emphasized the importance of protecting the Indus River, which is crucial to Sindh’s and its people’s survival.
NTUF -General Secretary Nasir Mansoor has emphasized that rivers are living units and to disturb their natural stream is not only an ecological crime but also a threat to regional stability
He also pointed out that Pakistan’s coastal areas, once home to the world’s seventh largest mangrove forests, have been destroyed, and Indus Delta, the world’s fifth most delta, is now in danger. Zehra Khan, Secretary General of the Home -based Women Workers Federation described the construction of the Six Canal Project as a “suicide act” that would aggravate the region’s vulnerability to climate change.
The Academic Sajjad Zaheer expressed solidarity with Sindh’s resistance to the six channel project and other infrastructure projects that damage the region’s ecology. Zaheer remembered Sindh’s historical battles against the Kalabagh dam.
Tabassum Khoso from the IMDAD Foundation highlighted the growing environmental threat to coastal areas such as Thatta and Sajawal.
Fisher people Forum
On International Rivers Day, on March 14, a large number of Fisherwomen and men participated with political and human rights activists in Pakistan Fisher people Forum’s rally against cholistan and other channels on the Indus River. The demand for rally was no channels, no dams and no cuts on the river Indus.
The protest started in Ibrahim Hyderi and ended at Mal Jetty. The central Secretary General of Pakistan Fishers Saeed Baloch said the fight for Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum against the construction of six channels on the Indus River will continue.
Rally goes to Kotri Barrage
The Kotri barrier, the last engineering structure of the river Indus, before meeting the Arabian Sea, remained flooded on Friday, albeit with the people who seemed in weapons to defend what they certainly thought to be their right on the river.
Nationalist political parties, divergent groups of citizens and farmers organized separate events from Hyderabad and Jamshoro, where the barrier was their convergence point.
Protests and events were also taken beyond the province on Friday with an unusually broader participation of the people who marked the international action day of Rivers by calling for a cessation of the project of building six channels on the river. People showered rose petals by the river and also paid tribute to.
“For over 150 years, Punjab’s ruling elite has exploited Sindh’s water by constructing channels and dams,” said lawyer Vasand Thaari, president of Awami Tehreek, who led an over two kilometer walk to the barrier on Friday.
Jay Sindh Mahaz’s chairman Riaz Ali Chandio, who led his party, is rally at the barrier, said that people in Sindh will not allow feudal gentlemen to sit in the provincial government to rob their right across the river. Sindh Hari Committee President Samar Hyder Jatoi argued that President Zardari’s speech, in which he rejected the canals, also approved struggles of the protesting people of Sindh that they anticipate desertification in the province if the canals are fed with the river’s water.
