Ramtin Shahrzad - Radio Zamaneh - August 6, 2023
After decades of promises from Iranian presidents and other senior officials about reviving Lake Urmia, the symbol of their management is clearly visible from space: this lake, no longer blue, has turned into a dry desert. At the same time, environmental experts have provided their grim estimates: Initially, it was said that the lake would dry up by the end of summer 2016, and now it is being reported that by the end of August, we will witness the drying of 98% of the lake. Any water released from the dams, given the current climatic conditions, will evaporate and will not help restore the lake.
The suffering from imprisonment for protesting the accelerated drying of Lake Urmia is still ongoing for many activists. In 2011, Iranian civil society witnessed the arrest of dozens of individuals during protests against the continuation of dam construction projects. In September of that year, the Iranian Parliament rejected the two-pronged emergency plan to save Lake Urmia, and people in cities like Tabriz and Urmia took to the streets in protest.
Like in recent years, Iranian officials viewed these protests as "security-related" and continue to suppress efforts to preserve what remains of Lake Urmia. A recent example is the "summoning of 11 civil activists to the Ministry of Intelligence’s supervision office in Tabriz and Ardabil," as reported by Iran Human Rights on August 3, 2023.
Although the voices of people protesting the lake's continued drying can be heard these days from figures like the Friday prayer leader of Tabriz and other officials: dam construction, agriculture, deeper wells, industrial and urban water use are draining water from reaching Lake Urmia. Ultimately, what reaches the lake might be "treated wastewater from Urmia."
Alongside this, climate change caused by global warming has altered precipitation patterns around Lake Urmia. This year, being an El Niño year, means heat waves that rapidly evaporate the limited water in the lake. However, climate change is no more than the corruption of politicians, whether in Iran or the United States.
The result of the prevailing corruption in the Islamic Republic can be observed from space: Lake Van in Turkey and Lake Sevan in Armenia, not far from Lake Urmia, are relatively well-preserved. However, Iran's largest lake, once covering 6,000 square kilometers of water, has now become a center of dust storms and is no longer the sixth-largest saline lake in the world, nor the largest saline lake in the Middle East, nor the 25th-largest lake in the world.
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Rahmanli recreational and tourist port is one of the most important ports of Lake Urmia. After the lake dried up, this port was destroyed and abandoned. Photo: Maryam Ebrahimeh. |
Finger-pointing among officials: "Critics have become the culprits"
Mohammad Sadegh Motamedi, the Governor of West Azerbaijan and Secretary of the National Task Force for the Revival of Lake Urmia, on August 6, attempted to shift the blame from current officials to others. He admitted that "fruit orchards and excessive consumption in agriculture" are diverting a significant portion of the water that should flow into Lake Urmia. He also mentioned the existence of "115,000 orchards in the lake’s watershed, with just as many wells, of which more than 70,000 are illegal," and concluded by saying:
"Opponents of the regime and government are trying to use the issue of the lake to pursue specific political and personal objectives. They are doing everything they can to question the government’s efforts to revive the lake, while they themselves are the cause of the current situation."
He believes that the "current government's policy on the revival of Lake Urmia is clear" and listed the latest actions by the government: "Releasing 330 million cubic meters of water annually from the Kani Dam, inaugurating the Urmia wastewater treatment plant, and completing the filling of the Chaparabad Dam, which will be officially inaugurated during Government Week."
The Chaparabad Dam, one of the many dams in the Lake Urmia watershed, is designed to provide water to 1,053 hectares of nearby orchards and lands, and also aims to channel water from the Chaparabad, Lavin, and Kani Rish rivers into Lake Urmia.
Like other dams in western Iran, the completion of the Chaparabad Dam will submerge part of the 7,000-year-old history of the region, much of which remains unexplored.
To date, 52 dams have been constructed in the Lake Urmia watershed, with ten more ready for operation and studies underway for at least 37 more. If all these dams are completed, 99 dams will block the remaining water flow into Lake Urmia.
Meanwhile, the Iranian Department of Environment continues to make "requests" to other ministries of the Islamic regime. As the head of the organization, Ali Salajegheh, told Shafaqna on August 6:
"Currently, due to the agricultural season and increased water consumption for farming, the water inflow and outflow to Lake Urmia have decreased. In the first meeting of the National Lake Urmia Headquarters, we will again request that the necessary water rights for this sector be provided."
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Photo: Bardia Saadat, Lake Urmia. |
Concerns About Climate Migration Affecting Millions in Northwestern Iran
It is not just the people of Iran who are concerned about the complete drying of Lake Urmia and the dust storms that could extend hundreds of kilometers, even reaching around Tehran. Turkey, which is in the process of completing a border wall with Iran, is one of the countries concerned about the situation of this lake.
Anadolu Agency, affiliated with the Turkish government, in an interview with Tuba Eörüm Maden, policy coordinator at the Turkish Water Institute, cited an example of climate migration statistics in Urmia. It was reported that in 1986, the rural and urban populations of Urmia were 51% and 49%, respectively, but by 2016, this difference had changed to 28% rural and 72% urban. Maden stated:
"Migration from rural areas to cities is observed across all regions of Iran, but studies show that migration density is higher in the Urmia basin, and this is due to the shrinking of the lake. Thousands of hectares of agricultural land have been damaged because of the drying of Lake Urmia, and three million people have migrated due to increased unemployment."
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| The situation of Lake Urmia in the last four years as of August 4th. |
Yusuf Alizadeh, a postdoctoral researcher at Istanbul Technical University, also told Anadolu Agency:
"When considering the climate factor, namely the increase in temperature and decrease in rainfall, it can be said that only 20% of the lake's drying is due to climate, while 80% of the cause is human activity."
The complete drying of Lake Urmia could make Urmia and Tabriz, as well as other cities and villages in the lake's basin, uninhabitable. As Azadeh Mokhtari, a journalist, wrote on Twitter, "The lives of more than 14 million Iranians are at risk."