2023-07-19 15:46:00
WASHINGTON.- The taps are running dry across Iran.
On Sunday, a record confluence of heat and humidity resulted in a wind chill over 65.5 degrees, at the very limits of human survival, measured at Iran’s Persian Gulf International Airport. Earlier this month, more than 1,000 people sought medical treatment following the dust storms will devastate the southeast of the country, in need of water.
From Tehran to rural regions, people are posting videos on social media complaining regarding endless hot days without running water; their faucets emit nothing but cloudy drops.
Water scarcity, which experts say is largely due to decades of mismanagement, is a longstanding problem. But they have become more serious as climate change accelerates, and are a growing source of discontent, sparking protests and clashes in recent years.
Over the weekend, the head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps warned once morest demonstrations during a visit to drought-stricken Khuzestan, a recurring center of riots. Local officials in the northeastern province of Golestan ordered tanker trucks on Monday to prevent protests. The government cannot afford new threats to its authority following its relentless crackdown on protests once morest theocratic rule that grew last year out of protests over the death of Mahsa Amini, a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, in the custody of the “morality police”.
Protesters cover their heads with a scarf during a protest near the Turkish Embassy in Baghdad once morest the shortage of water supply from the Euphrates and Tigris riversAmeer Al-Mohammedawi – dpa
In public messages, Iran’s leaders have tried to deflect blame onto the Taliban, who rule in the neighbor Afghanistanby restrict the flow of water in the Helmand River. Officials have also blamed flooding and falling rocks for disrupting dams around Tehran, and ordinary citizens for their consumption of water and electricity. But those explanations have left many unsatisfied: People interviewed for this report in six provinces described an unsustainable and worsening water crisis, for which the government has not claimed responsibility.
For decades, authorities in Iran have tried to appease immediate demands from the agricultural sector, a bedrock of political support, by construction of dozens of dams that divert the natural flow and accumulation of water, said Kaveh Madanidirector of a United Nations think tank on water, who resigned as deputy head of Iran’s Environment Department and left the country in 2018, facing accusations of espionage for the West.
Politics have taken their toll. Agriculture is sapping Iran’s surface water, stored in rivers, lakes, wetlands and reservoirs, Madani said, but most worrying is the depletion of groundwater reserves, deep below the surface and slow to replenish, which They have gone “bankrupt”. Experts say that the damage is irreversible.
Iran’s leaders “are looking for something to tell people, that will give them some kind of reason for their neglect over the years,” said a former environmental official in Sistan and Balochistan province, a region bordering Afghanistan severely affected by water. The scarcity of water is “showing them the extent of their incompetence.” He spoke on condition of anonymity, as did all those interviewed in Iran for this article, to preserve their safety and that of their families.
Residents of Iran’s capital faced an unusual test last month, making queue to fill and load jerrycans following water stopped flowing to taps in parts of the city.
Mohsen Ardakani, chief executive of the Tehran Provincial Water and Wastewater Company, a public utility, rejected the reports of water shortages. He told state-affiliated media that some areas faced “water fluctuations.” But some residents of Tehran and neighboring Karaj still without running water according to reports shared online.
“What scares me is that if we are running out of water now, what will happen to our children tomorrow?” said a 35-year-old man from Tehran who owns a technology company. The water crisis has left him wondering if he wants to marry and raise children in the fields.
Iran’s Environment Department did not respond to a request for comment. The Washington Post is not accredited to work in Iran.
Boasting a diverse terrain, from deserts to ice-covered mountains, Iran It is located in a region among the most vulnerable to climate change, according to research. The effects are already far-reaching. As mean temperatures rise, Extreme weather events, such as dust storms and floods, intensify. Desertification, sinkholes and salty soil are widespread.
While climate change is “adding fuel,” Madani said, “the house was already on fire.”
Iran’s President Ebrahim RaisiGetty Images
Through decades of US sanctions and hostile relations with the West, Tehran has subsidized agriculture to secure food and jobs. The sector consumes regarding 90 percent of available water, said Soroosh Sorooshian, director of the Center for Hydrometeorology and Remote Sensing at the University of California at Irvine. As the years go by, the wells must be dug deeper.
Even following a relatively rainy year, the most important reservoirs for drinking water and irrigation are more than 80 percent empty, Iran’s official Water Resources Management Company told state-affiliated media this month.
The authorities are adamant regarding building more dams and redirecting water to address shortages in the near term, Madani said. After years of deterioration, “you can’t restore lakes and wetlands at a point in time,” she said. “You cannot restore the groundwater level when you decide to, or completely prevent sand and dust storms, deforestation and all the loss of biodiversity.”
In May, Tehran turned its anger on the Taliban, accusing them of violating a 1973 water treaty by restricting the flow of the shared Helmand River from Afghanistan into Iran. The Taliban blamed the overall decline of the river plagued by drought. Tensions reached their highest level following two Iranian border guards and an Afghan soldier were killed in a clash along the border in May. Days later, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi traveled to the area to defend “Iranians’ right to water” said.
People take part in a protest near the Turkish Embassy in BaghdadAmeer Al-Mohammedawi – dpa
The clashes occurred along the border between Sistan and Balochistan province, whose capital, Zahedan, has been one of the remaining strongholds of anti-government protests since the state violently cracked down on the 2018 “woman, life, freedom” movement. past. During months of protests, Iranian security forces killed more than 500 people and executed at least seven in connection with the protests, according to the Iran-focused Human Rights Activists News Agency.
Experts say the river is only part of the story. The former Sistan and Balochistan official said the Taliban were a useful scapegoat for Tehran.
“Suppose the Taliban give Iran its share of water,” he said. The water crisis would still be far from being resolved.
Some of the drier provinces, such as Khuzestan, along with Sistan and Balochistan, are historically home to many Sunni Muslims in Iran’s Shiite majority. Water scarcity exacerbates poverty in these marginalized communities and keeps migration away from them, the official said.
“We are facing constant water cuts that prevent us from carrying out our daily activities,” said a 33-year-old woman from Khuzestan province. “When we ask the authorities for help, their answer is: ‘Use less water.’”
Demonstrators chant slogans during a protest over the death of Mahsa Amini in Tehran, Iran, in September 2022AP
In July 2021, in the midst of a devastating drought in Khuzestan, security forces killed at least eight protesters following days of anti-government protests. Solidarity protests broke out in several cities, including Tehran. In November, security forces clashed with protesters in Iran’s third-largest city, Isfahan, who were demonstrating in support of drought-stricken farmers. Once once more, the protests spread.
“After the 2021 protests, nature came to the rescue and we had more rain,” said a 48-year-old man from Isfahan who works in the steel industry, “but absolutely nothing changed in water management.”
By Miriam Berger and Sanam Mahoozi
The Washington PostConocé The Trust Project
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