Dawn
-
16:56 Jun 15, 2025
The Indus River remains colonised, declared activists, lawyers, and civil society members at a climate justice conference in Karachi on Sunday, calling for resistance against extractive policies and the erasure of indigenous knowledge. Arranged by the Climate Action Centre, ‘The Indus Resistance Conference’, held for the first time, is a forum aiming to amplify the voices of “frontline defenders” against the exploitation of natural resources. The first of its kind, the conference brought together women, the working class, lawyers, students and journalists committed to the cause of climate justice. Pakistan was ranked as the most vulnerable country to climate change in 2022. “The Indus River is on its deathbed,” said Yasir Darya, founder of the Climate Action Centre (CAC), as he initiated the one-day conference, addressing resource theft and climate injustice in Sindh. He called for granting the river “personhood status” to ensure its preservation against what he termed “colonial policies, water theft, and cap...