Amnesty International (AI) has called for a keen focus on saving lives and providing urgent support to those who lost their homes and livelihoods to Cyclone Freddy.

Development Diaries reports that the rights organisation made the call in response to the devastating impact of the storm which has claimed more than 60 lives in Mozambique and Malawi.

Cyclone Freddy struck central Mozambique in Zambezia on 11 March, destroying homes and causing widespread flooding. The storm also brought down telephone lines and power cables, leading to communication outages.

The cyclone further lashed Malawi with heavy rains, bringing landslides to rural areas and impacting Blantyre with serious flooding.

‘While we are still awaiting details on the full extent of the damage in countries that are currently being ravaged by Cyclone Freddy, it is clear that the official death toll will rise in both Malawi and Mozambique, as will reports of wrecked infrastructure’, AI’s Interim Director for East and Southern Africa, Tigere Chagutah, said in a statement.

AI noted that the affected countries must also be compensated for loss and damage caused by the cyclone.

It is understood that Malawi and Mozambique are among the countries least responsible for climate change, yet they are facing the full force of storms driven mostly by carbon emissions from the world’s richest nations.

Data from the African Development Bank (AfDB) shows that Africa is the most vulnerable continent to climate change.

Climate change poses systemic risks to the continent’s economies, infrastructure investments, water and food systems, public health, agriculture, and livelihoods.

Development Diaries calls for an urgent response from the Africa Adaptation Acceleration Programme (AAAP), which is a joint initiative of the AfDB and the Global Centre on Adaptation (GCA) to support Africa’s low-income countries impacted by climate change.

Photo source: Eldson Chagara/Reuters