ONE of the world’s largest marshes, home to the Marsh Arabs of southern Iraq,
has all but disappeared over the past decade, according to satellite images
released this week by the UN Environment Programme. UNEP’s director, Klaus
Toepfer, describes the loss as “a major ecological disaster, comparable to the
drying of the Aral Sea and the deforestation of Amazonia”.
But claims that this environmental and human disaster is largely due to
drainage projects carried out by Saddam Hussein in the aftermath of the Gulf War
were contested by hydrologists this week. They say that dams built by Turkey in
the…
