Restoration of Iraqi Wetlands

Recently, on National Public Radio, a correspondent interviewed an ambitious Iraqi-American engineer. This engineer, Dr. Azzam Alwash, is the founder of a program called Nature Iraqi. One of Dr. Alwash’s ambitions is to restore a region in southern Iraq, near the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, that was once home to thriving wetlands. Some biblical scholars believed that this area was the home of the Garden of Eden. To provide some idea of its scope, it was larger than the Florida Everglades.

Under the regime of Sadam Hussein, these wetlands were completely drained and destroyed after the people living in the surrounding areas took part in an uprising against Hussein in 1991. Several environmental groups have referred to Hussein’s endeavor to drain these wetlands as the worst human-engineered environmental disaster of the twentieth-century. After Hussein stopped the uprising, he decided to have Iraqi engineers construct six artificial rivers along the Tigris and Euphrates that diverted water away from the wetlands. After this happened, the region became a barren desert, and nearly all of the animal life in the region vanished.

Now, Dr. Alwash has become the head of the effort to restore this region to its former Garden of Eden glory. However, he claims that the people of Iraqi deserve just as much credit as he does in beginning the restoration process. When he traveled to the country in 2003, he noticed that ordinary citizens were digging holes in the embankments of the artificial rivers in order to get water flowing back to the wetland areas. As of now about thirty-five percent of the wetlands are restored, and there would have been a continuing upward trend if not for recent droughts during the past two years.

Dr. Alwash faces political difficulties in that the Iraqi as well as Turkish governments need water for things such as the irrigation of fields, but he is slowly reaching the agreements that he needs to provide enough water to these wetlands. Time will tell if Dr. Alwash will succeed.

-Evan Aronson, Legal Intern