CHIBAYISH, Iraq (AP) — Abbas Hashem sets his worried gaze on the horizon — the day was almost over and there was still no sign of the last of his water buffaloes. He knows that when his animals don’t return from roaming the swamps of this component of Iraq, they will have to be dead.
Dry land cracks beneath their feet and thick layers of small-sized reeds are covered in salt in Chibayish’s wetlands amid severe shortages of new water from this year’s Tigris.
Hashem has already lost five buffaloes from his herd of 20 since May, weakened by hunger and poisoned by salt water seeping into the low-lying swamps. Other bison farmers say their animals are also dead or generate unsaleable milk.
“This once full of life position,” he said. Now it’s a desert, a cemetery. “
The wetlands, a lush remnant of the cradle of civilization and a stark contrast to the desert prevalent in the Middle East, were reborn after the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, when the dams he had built to drain the region and eradicate Shiite rebels. were dismantled.
But today, the drought that experts say is due to climate replacement and salt invasion, coupled with the lack of a political settlement between Iraq and Turkey, is endangering the marshes surrounding the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in southern Iraq.
This year, severe water shortages, the worst in 40 years, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, have pushed bison herders deeper into poverty and debt, forcing many to leave their homes and migrate to nearby places in search of work. .
Rural communities that depend on agriculture and livestock have long been alienated from the authorities in Baghdad, embroiled in political crises. And when the government introduced harsh water rationing policies this year, other people in the region became even more desperate.
Oil-rich Iraq has failed to rebuild the country’s replaced water source and irrigation infrastructure, and hopes for a deal to share Tigris River water with its upstream neighbor, Turkey, have faded, hampered by intransigence and conflicting political loyalties in Iraq.
In the swamps, where water buffalo farming has been the way of life for generations, anger against the government is palpable.
Hamza Noor discovered a plot where a new thread of water flows. The 33-year-old goes out five times a day in his small boat from the swamps, filling jerry cans with water and taking it for his animals.
Between Noor and his two brothers, the family circle has lost 20 buffaloes since May, he said. But unlike other pastors who went to town, he stays.
“I don’t know of any other work,” he said.
Ahmed Mutliq feels the same way. The thirty-year-old grew up in the swamps and says he has experienced droughts years before.
“But nothing compares to this year,” he said. He suggested the government draw more water from reservoirs upstream, and blamed northern provinces and neighboring countries for “taking the water away from us. “
Provincial officials, deprived of power in Iraq’s centralized government, have no answers.
“We feel ashamed,” said Salah Farhad, head of the agriculture directorate of Dhi Qar province. “Farmers are asking us for more water and we can’t do anything. “
Iraq in the Tigris-Euphrates River basin for drinking water, irrigation and sanitation for its entire population of 40 million. Competing claims over the basin, which stretches from Turkey through Syria and Iran before reaching Iraq, have confounded Baghdad’s ability to expand a water framework.
Ankara and Baghdad have not reached an agreement on a constant debt for the Tigris. Turkey is obligated through a 1987 agreement to deliver 500 cubic meters at the time to Syria, which then stores the water with Iraq.
But Ankara has fulfilled its legal responsibility in recent years due to falling water levels and rejects any long-term sharing agreement that requires a constant number to be released.
Iraq’s annual water plan prioritizes providing enough drinking water for the country first, then supplying the agricultural sector and also discharging enough water into swamps to minimize salinity. This year, the amounts have been cut in half.
Salinity in the marshes has increased further, with a water-stressed Iran diverting water from its Karkheh River, which feeds Iraq’s marshes.
Iraq has made even less progress in exchanging water with Iran.
“With Turkey, there is a dialogue, many delays,” said Hatem Hamid, who heads the key branch of Iraq’s water ministry in terms of formulating the water plan. “With Iran, there is nothing. “
Two officials from the legal department of Iraq’s Foreign Ministry, which handles court cases opposing the countries, said attempts to discuss with Iran over water exchange had been halted through officials, adding the office of then-Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi.
“We were told not to communicate with Iran,” one of the officials said. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss legal issues.
Iraq’s desires are so acute that several Western countries and humanitarian organizations seek to provide progressive assistance to Iraq to modernize its aging water infrastructure and modernize old agricultural practices.
The U. S. Geological Survey The U. S. has trained Iraqis to read satellite imagery to “strengthen Iraq’s hand in negotiations with Turkey,” said a U. S. diplomat, who also spoke on condition of anonymity because of ongoing negotiations.
When the sun set over Chibayish, Hashem’s buffalo never returned: the sixth animal it lost.
“I don’t have anything my buffaloes,” he said.