ISLAMABAD, 9 November 2005 — The United Nations said yesterday that one month after the devastating earthquake it was ready for the “colossal job” of keeping survivors alive during the Himalayan winter. “The job is colossal but there is a feeling that this is a doable job,” UN Emergency Coordinator Jan Vandemoortele said.

“It is not mission impossible. The job can be done and to get it done we need two things, cash and coordination,” Vandemoortele told a news conference. “Perhaps for the first time since the 8th of October there is a sense of cautious optimism in the humanitarian community,” he added.

Just two weeks after the massive Oct. 8 earthquake that killed more than 73,000 people in Pakistan, aid officials were in a desperate situation in trying to reach survivors but things had improved in the past fortnight, he said.

The government, meanwhile, stuck to the 73,000 death toll figure, disputing the death count of 87,000 by the World Bank and Asian Development Bank. The spokesman for Pakistan Federal Relief Commissioner said that they do not agree with the figures given in the report. “We don’t agree with the figures given out by World Bank and Asian Development Bank, the official figures remain 73,276 and our figures are based on actual body count,” said the spokesman for the Federal Relief Commissioner Maj. Gen. Farooq Ahmed Khan. The commissioner, however, indicated that the death toll could rise further as more data is made available to the authorities.

UN officials in Islamabad have said that the organization has stepped up its appeal for more money to help build shelters, warning that an estimated 350,000 people still need accommodation.

Though cash-strapped, the UN was racing against time to save survivors from the bitter cold in the mountains of Kashmir and Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province. “We see that the pipeline is gradually becoming a reality in terms of money and in terms of deliverables — the tents the blankets, the slates for the latrines,” Vandemoortele said.

“It is moving. And if we can keep the momentum, and there is no reason that we should not able to keep momentum on our side, we will be ready for the winter,” he said. “We are confident that we will be able to continue our operation because resources are coming on a daily basis. We are also drawing from the UN revolving fund and we have clearly looked on our logistics needs because it was a big-ticket item on our flash appeal. And the news that we just heard about the roads being opened has a major impact on the requirements in terms of dollars to keep these operations going.”

On the cash side a total of $1.4 billion has been pledged to Pakistan and $380 million of that has been handed over so far, he said. Some $85 million has come through the UN.

The United Nations also launched a “school in a box” project yesterday to help restart classes in earthquake-devastated Pakistan, where thousands of children died when their schools were destroyed last month.

UNICEF estimates 17,000 children were killed when hundreds of schools collapsed when the disaster struck during morning classes. It plans to distribute 2,000 boxes in the earthquake zone containing slates, pencils, chalk, colored pencils and notebooks to help efforts to restart classes.

At least 10,000 schools were damaged or destroyed in the quake, UNICEF said. Each box can accommodate 40 students for about three months, said UNICEF’s Claudia Hudspeth at a ceremony in which she handed one over to the headmistress of a government school in Muzaffarabad, capital of Pakistani Kashmir.

The Narol Government High School is one of only 10 in Muzaffarabad that have restarted classes since the disaster. They are being held in tents in the ruins of the school building.

“It was one of the best schools of Muzaffarabad,” said new headmistress Khalida Khaliq, who was appointed last week after her predecessor was killed in the earthquake.

— Additional input from agencies