Indian PM calls Pakistan to offer aid

2010-08-19 14:41

New Delhi - The Indian prime minister called his Pakistani counterpart on Thursday to express solidarity over the country's devastating floods and to urge him to accept an offer of aid.

Relations between the two countries, which have fought three wars since 1947, are tense and contact rare, with a wide-ranging peace process begun back in 2004 currently suspended.

India offered $5m last week in aid after Pakistan endured its worst floods in 80 years, but Islamabad is yet to decide whether to accept the gesture.

Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh rang Pakistan's Yousuf Raza Gilani "to express his sense of sorrow and to condole the deaths resulting from the huge floods", Singh's office said in a statement.

He also said India "had already made an offer of assistance and was ready to do more to assist in the relief effort".

"In such times of natural disasters, all of South Asia should rise to the occasion and extend every possible help to the people of Pakistan affected by the tragedy," Singh said.

The UN estimated on Thursday that 4.6 million survivors were still without shelter. The US has urged Pakistan not to let political rivalry stand in the way of helping its citizens in flood-ravaged regions.

"You have a country that's willing to help, and we expect that Pakistan will accept," a US State Department spokesperson was quoted as saying in local media in reference to the Indian offer of assistance.

- AFP