Iraq diary: The dying marshes of the Tigris and Euphrates
Chibayish, Iraq: This may be the simplest story in the world, gone wrong.
For six millennium, from the time of the Sumerians, the marshes of the Tigris and Euphrates have provided a complete livelihood to the tribes of the Shat al Arab. The natural hydrology of the confluence of the Tigris and Euphrates has meant that the Tigris – flowing out of Turkey, across the entire length of the Iraqi desert – has slid across a six-meter incline to join the Euphrates until the two rivers become one on their way to the Gulf (Arabian or Persian depending upon your national inclination), forming a 9650-square-kilometer marshland (an area roughly the size of Lebanon).
The marshes produce reeds, which are used to build dwellings called mudhifs, cathedral-like, in as few as four days, on naturally occurring or manmade knolls throughout the marsh, collected into villages, or in small clusters of structures. Open structures hold water buffalo at night, who swim and wander through the marshes during the day. The reeds also provide mulch for the water buffalo, and the water buffalo provide milk as a staple. The marshes provide fish and a nutrient-rich muck for vegetables. The fish, broiled in racks standing at right angles to the coals, eaten with watercress and radish greens from the marshes, are another staple.
This fully sustainable ecosystem continued undisturbed for millennia, until the world of geopolitics exerted its influence followed by the emergent impact of climate change. In the early 1990s, Saddam Hussein determined the best way to take control of a vast area, in which dissident groups could hide, would be to drain the marshes. The process of destruction was a compounding of a long and gruesome conflict with Iran along the river borders, in which moving forces through the region would be simplified if the marshes were dry. Building a dike hundreds of kilometers long – serving to hold back the Euphrates from the confluence – was put in place. Then Turkey and northern Iraq began diverting the Tigris to other uses along its path and the flow dropped four-fold, so low that it could no long move along the incline to meet the Euphrates dike.
As the marshes dried up, evaporated, and disappeared, so did the population that depended upon them. From 60,000 residents in the late 1950s, belonging to six tribes, the population fell to 6,000 by 1995. The imminent final death of the marshes was broadcast and mourned by UNESCO and heritage groups throughout the world. And the death of the marshes would mean the extinction of a long and distinguished heritage of marsh Arabs as well. But the power of Hussein and the politics of the region meant little could be done in response.
Then Hussein was deposed by the invasion led by U.S. forces, and a window of opportunity for the marshes opened, first with a hole in the dike. Miraculously, the return of the waters began an almost instantaneous revival of the marshes. Soon the return of wandering tribes brought the population back up to 62,000. Suddenly the elders’ hopes were revived that a culture and way of life would be preserved. (The sparkle in the eyes of the shrieks of the Beni Asser was irrepressible when they were invited to remember their childhoods. Children and grandchildren wandered in and out of the motif where we were gathered.)
But no sooner did the dispersed return – from Iran, the Emirates, and the cities of Iraq to the East and North – than a plague of droughts and a catastrophe of dams began to exert their powers. Iran redirected all of the waters of the Kharoon to alternate uses in Iran, and absent the sweet water of the Iranian watershed, the salinity of the marshes began to rise and the volumes fall, so the land could not be flooded by the Tigris. With lower water levels and higher tides of the Gulf, there were further increases in the salinity of the water. Rice and other crops would no longer grow; fish populations changed. And Iraq’s dams reduced the flow of the Euphrates. The eight major cities along the course of the river dumped their raw sewage into the Major Outflow Drainage canal, further polluting the downstream. To meet the minimal requirements of the resurgent but struggling marshes, the hydrology was reversed and the Euphrates, polluted and diminished in its own right, was driven across the dried plain toward the Tigris. In the end, the flow of the Euphrates into the Gulf had to be completely closed so the currents are moderated and wastes do not move out of the system.
At the same time, oil exploration expanded and drilling fields were opened in the marshes. And to the North and West huge new dams are being built in Turkey, and water diverted to needs in Syria and Israel as well as Iraq.
The joy that Jassim al Asaadi, director of the Southern Basin work of Nature Iraq, feels for his work is palpable in his rehearsal of the history and statistics of his efforts to restore and preserve the marshes. His smile bursts out every time a sheik enters the community motif; every time a turn in the marsh runs brings us to an idle, to allow a neighbor to pass in a boat with a gunnels load of reeds; every time a policeman approaches the group, with a curiosity about the dozen foreigners examining a clever lock that allows the boats to move from the Tigris to the Euphrates watershed around gates controlling the flow of the Euphrates. He literally dances on the prow of the narrow marsh boats, as the drivers lift a spray-filled wake in the narrow channels.
Through the delightfully clever techniques of a young American journalist – who lives and works in Turkey, is part of our delegation, and shares a passion for the marsh issue – Jassim is coaxed into telling the story of his first kiss as a 15-year-old gathering reeds. This is also the story of visiting his father’s first store in the emerging town of Chibaishi after school each day. Particularly, it is a litany of eddies and lakes he likes to visit, and the birds and wildlife he looks for in the marshes (otters, turtles, fox).
He knows where the Sumerian ruins are buried. He knows the leadership of each tribe. And he knows the international environmental conventions, and coalitions, and partners he will need to work through and with to preserve this world heritage environment. We are another dozen arrows in his quiver to send the message abroad about the threats to this place and its peoples. Ally’s interview techniques also reveal that one of the drivers is a University of Basra graduate who returns to the marshes whenever he can for the sheer love of the place and to support fellow villager Jassim in his mission.
The visit was arranged by a young cadre of activists, both Iraqis and internationals – Joanna Rivera, an American of Puerto Rican heritage; Jantine from The Netherlands; Ahmed from Baghdad, working with Nature Iraq – seeking to a devise a strategy from this unique collection of visiting activists to organize an international campaign. It will be an effort worth watching. It has its parallels in the Yellow River dams of China; the stories of the Nile, and Amazon, and Colorado; the victories of the Glen Canyon Dam; and the risks of the Isilu. Time will tell if a growing coalition of young environmentalists will make a difference; but there isn’t much time left.
[Shat al Arab — Jassim al Asaadi, Nature Iraq, Southern Basin]
Mark Johnson is executive director of the Fellowship of Reconciliation.
Photo by Mark Johnson