In defence of the Tigris and Euphrates, birthplace of civilisation
The Marshes of Mesopotamia are at risk of drying up due to drought and inadequate water resource management. We met some of the activists working to protect them.
Salman Kharillah was 15 years old the first time he drank from the River Tigris. To avoid becoming a militia target he decided to leave school and get a job, It was 2005 / 2006, when levels of violence between the armies present in Iraq were soaring. For Iraqi adolescents, there were not many alternatives: “ you had to avoid being killed on your way home from school and, if you were part of a militia, you ran the risk of being captured and forced to join one,” he recalls. After a short while, Salman Kharallih joined “Nature Iraq” as an assistant in the laboratory in Baghdad, and just one year later he was running it.
A campaign to clean the Mesopotamian Marshes
Now, this thirty-year-old man is coordinating the advocacy campaign Save the Tigris and Iraqi marshes, launched in 2012 by various Iraqi associations and supported by the Italian ONG Un Oonte Per… (UPP) in order to attract international attention to Iraq’s heritage and water resources. Every six months, Salman goes to the Mesopotamian Marshes to check the water levels of the Tigris and the Euphrates. “If I can’t do the regular checks, I try the water in Baghdad”, he says.
Very young activists
When we meet him, it is an extremely hot day in late June. The temperature is already almost 40 degrees at dawn. Baghdad is still asleep but a group of young activists are waiting for a coach to arrive. They are all between 17 and 29 years of age and they work with various organisations of Iraqi Civil Society. They are heading for a Marshlands Festival in the Marshes of Chibayish, about 400 km south of the capital, in the heart of the greenbelt. “We are going to see our beautiful marshlands and the consequences of dams on the environment and the local population,” says Salman. Amongst them are many organisations of the Iraqi Social Forum, of Sport Against Violence and the network of Iraqi activists, built around the Iraqi Civil Society Solidarity Initiative (ICSSI). There are human rights lawyers, female language and engineering students from the university. There are photographers, journalists, artists and film directors. Their common aim? Defending water resources and the environment.
The problem is that water is not a national priority
“Our politicians do not consider water to be a national priority,” explains Ali Aklharhi, activist and founder of the “Human Dijlah” association and expert in water resources. On the other hand we have internal management problems, such as the lack of modern irrigation methods and water wastage in intensive farming. We are also vulnerable in terms of international relations, with 70% of our water controlled by Iran and Turkey. Neighbouring countries manage the rivers and dams and can use changes in water flow against us. The Iraqi government is not strong enough to include water management as a priority on its international agenda,” explains the activist.
The Marshes are at risk of drying up
The absence of water policy, drought and the building of huge dams upstream, like the one built in Ilisu, Turkey and Daryan, Iran, could drastically reduce the flow of water to the Tigris and the Euphrates. This is a major threat not only to the rivers but also to the Mesopotamian Marshes, listed on the UNESCO list of heritage sites, together with the Sumarian sites of Eridu and Uruk since 2016, thanks to campaigning by Iraqi activists.
Without water, the Marshes are at risk of drying up, and the local Madaan population of Marsh Arabs, would be displaced.
“Every year we lose 11million cubic metres of water through evaporation, if we add to that goal warming, ground salinity and the absence of water management policies, in 10 years time the river water buffaloes will be extinct and the Madaan population will be forced to leave this land,” explains Jassim Al – Asadi of the Nature Iraq association.
Ismaeel Dawood, Iraqi human rights activist and advocacy manager for Un Ponte Per… agrees. “It is a cultural problem. We have to change irrigation methods, protect plants and animals and focus on water management. If we lose the Mesopotanian marshes, we are losing the only example of this type of environmental and cultural heritage in the world.”
Water as an instrument of peace
To draw attention to the issue of water in Iraq, last May environmental associations launched a viral campaign on Arabic social networks with the hashtag Iraq without rivers. their next goal is to organise a Forum on water in Mesopotamia, scheduled for 5-7 April 2019 in Sulaymaniyah, in northern Iraq.
“Today water is used as a political instrument by Iran and Turkey against Kurds, Syrians and us Iraqis. Water belongs to all of us. The population needs it to be used as an instrument of sustainable peace and not as a way to assert political dominance and cause more war,” states Salman.
By Sara Manisera for Lifegate
Photo by Arianna Pagani