This New Year brought with it a catastrophe to the Hunza Valley, in Gilgit-Baltistan. On 4 January, a crack in the slope of the village lands of Attabad, in the Upper Hunza Valley, widened, causing terraces and houses to collapse. A major landslide subsequently led to a wave of dust and gravel, which eventually blocked and dammed the Hunza River. Since then, that water has been collecting into a massive lake, which by mid-May was threatening to overflow its banks, inundating dozens of villages.
The crack in the slope was actually discovered more than a decade ago, in the aftermath of the Astor earthquake of 1998. At that time, humanitarian organisations such as Focus, an Aga Khan-funded NGO, advised nearby villagers to begin moving their homes, warning that the area was highly unstable. Government authorities refrained from designing a proper resettlement scheme, and villagers hesitated in leaving. As a result, some 19 people recently lost their lives, nearly 50 houses were completely destroyed, and more than 1500 people have been displaced. Nearly two kilometres of the Karakoram Highway, Chinese-engineered work on which was taking place, was damaged and left covered by debris; other roads and bridges have been submerged in the Gojal area of Upper Hunza, including Gulmit, the administrative tehsil headquarters of Gojal. The lake level, meanwhile, continued to rise.
Mitigating the disaster fell to the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), which in recent weeks has been constructing a spill-over channel. This is meant to stop the water level from rising, and could eventually allow for a controlled drainage. When the landslide occurred, the Hunza River was releasing only two percent of its summer melt waters; since then, of course, that run-off rate has increased day by day, even as politicians, activists and engineers have debated how to proceed. While some have suggested utilising the lake water for power generation or tourism purposes, others have wondered at the stability of the dam, though often without sound geological and geo-morphological evidence. Another faction wanted to destabilise the dam by bombing it, to get rid of the potential problem once and for all.
Inevitably, culprits have also been sought, with demonstrations being staged against bureaucrats and politicians, mainly accusing them of inaction. Initially, the supply of basic foodstuffs and the transport of ailing people were enabled by army helicopters. As the crisis grew, a ferry service allowing the transportation of people and goods was implemented. By 21 May, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gillani, on a visit to the area, pledged compensation of PKR 100,000 for each affected family, as well as the expedition of a PKR 15 billion previously announced for Gilgit-Baltistan. Still, on both sides of the lake, trucks ready to transport goods to and from the Sost Dry Port, the hub for China-Pakistan trade across the Kunjerab Pass, were stuck. International trade along the only functional corridor between Central and South Asia has thus been forced to a grinding and undetermined halt.