Mesopotamian marshes threatened by pollutants
70 percent of Iraq’s industrial waste is dumped directly into rivers or the sea
Chibayish, Iraq, May 5: In southern Iraq, putrid water gushes out of waste pipes into marshes reputed to be home to the biblical Garden of Eden, threatening an already fragile world heritage site.
In a country where the state lacks the capacity to guarantee basic services, 70 percent of Iraq’s industrial waste is dumped directly into rivers or the sea, according to data compiled by the United Nations and academics.
Jassim al-Assadi, head of non-governmental organisation Nature Iraq, said the black wastewater poured into the UNESCO-listed marshes carries “pollution and heavy metals that directly threaten the flora and fauna” present there.
Once an engineer at Iraq’s water resources ministry, Assadi left that job to dedicate himself to saving the extraordinary natural habitat, which had previously faced destruction at the hands of dictator Saddam
Hussein and is further jeopardised by climate change.
The pollutants also “indirectly impact humans via the buffalo”, fixtures of the marshes and known for the “guemar” cheese produced from their milk, he said.
According to Nader Mohssen, a fisherman and farmer born in the marshland's Chibayish district, “the buffalo are forced to go several kilometres (miles) into the marshes to be able to drink something other than polluted water”.
And “around the sewerage pipes, most of the fish die”, he added, gesturing to dozens of rotting fish floating on the marsh water surface.
Pollution is only the latest threat to one of the world's largest inland delta systems.
The rich ecosystem, nestled between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, barely survived the wrath of Saddam, who ordered the marsh be drained in 1991 as punishment for communities protecting insurgents. The