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The authors of the study however stressed that due to large variations in seasonal monsoon rainfall over Pakistan historically, it was not possible to conclude that manmade warming contributed significantly to 60-day total rainfall levels.
“What we saw in Pakistan is exactly what climate projections have been predicting for years,” said Friederike Otto, senior lecturer in Climate Science at Imperial College London’s Grantham Institute.
“It’s also in line with historical records showing that heavy rainfall has dramatically increased in the region since humans started emitting large amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.”
FINANCE NEEDED
Otto said while it was hard to put a precise figure on the extent to which manmade emissions drove the rainfall, “the fingerprints of global warming are evident”.
The World Meteorological Organization this week said that weather-related disasters such as Pakistan’s had increased five-fold over the last 50 years, killing 115 people each day on average.
The warning came as nations are gearing up for the COP27 climate summit in Egypt in November, where at-risk countries are demanding that rich, historic polluters compensate them for the climate-drive loss and damage already battering their economies and infrastructure.
Fahad Saeed, researcher at the Center for Climate Change and Sustainable Development in Islamabad, said the floods showed the need for richer nations to radically ramp up funding to help others adapt to climate change – another key ask at COP27.
“Pakistan must also ask developed countries to take responsibility and provide adaptation plus loss and damage support to the countries and populations bearing the brunt of climate change,” he said.
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