Pakistan’s hope as lake fills: Flood villages to save a city

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistani engineers have cut into an embankment for one of the country’s largest lakes to release rising waters. They hope to save a nearby city and town from flooding as officials predict more monsoon rain was on the way for the country’s already devastated south. While officials hope the cut in the sides of Lake Manchar will protect about half a million people who live in the city of Sehwan and the town of Bhan Saeedabad, villages that are home to 150,000 people are in the path of the diverted waters. More than 1,300 people have died and millions have lost their homes in flooding caused by unusually heavy monsoon rains in Pakistan this year that many experts have blamed on climate change.