"I have to show my support and help."
Amir Khan has donated £20,000 to Pakistan’s flood relief scheme run by former Prime Minister Imran Khan.
“Monster monsoons” have claimed over 1,000 lives so far and damaged one million homes.
Non-stop rain has put most of Pakistan under water, sparking an urgent plea for help.
More than 33 million Pakistanis are believed to have been affected in some way by the disaster.
Amir Khan has now offered his help. He joined Imran Khan’s three-hour telethon and donated £20,000.
The former boxer has also pledged a weekly donation.
He called Mr Khan’s live programme and said:
“Hello Salaam, Amir Khan here, Imran Khan bhai, how are you, are you well?
“Imran, it’s lovely to see that you’re doing great work and I want to donate 5 million rupees now and inshallah every week we will keep donating 5 million rupees towards the amazing work that you’re doing.”
Amir has also announced that the Amir Khan Foundation is aiding rescue missions.
Please show your support and help @AKFoundation to support the Pakistan Flood Appeal, over 1,000 people killed and millions left homeless by heavy floods. ? https://t.co/SDhqNiKZaW
— Amir Khan (@amirkingkhan) August 30, 2022
Speaking about the floods, Amir said:
“My family being from Pakistan, I spend a lot of time in Pakistan, I have a huge fanbase in Pakistan, I feel that I have to show my support and help.
“Many times before whenever there’s been disasters or when they’ve needed help, I’ve always gone out there.”
When Pakistan was hit by floods in 2010, Amir travelled with Oxfam.
But he said that the current situation is “a lot worse”.
Amir continued: “A third of the country is underwater, over a thousand people that they know of have died, and they are finding many more, so you feel for the people there.”
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres described Pakistan’s plight as “a monsoon on steroids”, adding it was a “climate catastrophe”.
He added: “Schools and health facilities have been destroyed.
“Livelihoods are shattered, critical infrastructure wiped out, and people’s hopes and dreams have washed away.”
Amir said:
“This is a massive disaster for Pakistan.”
He explained that his parents are currently in the country on their summer holidays.
He continued: “I’ve been speaking to them regularly, they say things are really hard, even getting food, getting things from the shops, all the shops are flooded.
“It’s very sad to see this because being a British-Pakistani myself, this is where now I need to get that word out to people, to all my friends out there.
“This is to motivate the people out there to please come and show your support because this is a disaster, they’ve never had a bigger disaster than this.”
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