Ahwaz is in the midst of a water crisis and its worst drought in decades

The Ahwaz water shortage is described as the most critical since the earliest days of Ahwaz Elamite’s civilization. It is threatening to leave millions of people in the south of Iran without drinking water, said the human rights independent activists from Ahwaz.

Although Ahwaz has many large rivers, such as the Karoon and the Karkeh as well as the Shatt al-Arab, water has become salinated by intensive sugar cane production, making the water undrinkable. 

The extent of the river pollution in the area has led Iranian scientists to declare it an environmental "crisis zone." 

Clean drinking water is an increasingly scarce resource for millions of people in Ahwaz, according to new reports that we received from people in Ahwaz.

We can no longer drink this water," said one local woman from the village of al-sayhi. "Our animals are all dead and many people here are diseased". Down river, where the Karkeh spills out into the Shatt al-Arab waterway, the lack of fresh water has raised salinity levels so high that large number of Ahwazi villages has emigrated.
Across Ahwaz, the shrinking of the Karun River is having serious consequences on the functioning of water treatment plants. In underground aquifers, the salt content of the water is increasing. This water is often unfit for human consumption or even for agricultural use.
In some cases, Iranian Regime has diverted the path of Karun River to the northern provenance such as Isfahan. This has had a very damaging effect. 

“Ahwaz is in the midst of a water crisis and its worst drought in decades. The continuing water crisis has directly contributed to rising levels of food deprivation, displacement and poverty in Ahwaz” said Amjad Taha, the EAHRO spokes person.

Only 1 in 8 families outside Ahwaz have access to functioning sewage facilities. There are no signs of any treatment for the waste water and sewage produced in Ahwaz Rivers, with much of the rest discharged as raw sewage directly into the rivers. Ahwaz has been hit hard by what some are calling "an environmental catastrophe", as decades of the Iranian regime mismanagement, increased demand for water and the latest drought are turning the region's most fertile area into a wasteland. 

It worth notifying that in 2008 Iran's Minister of Health refused a glass of Ahwazi water, claiming it to be unfit for human consumption. Ministry of Health Kamran Bagheri Lankarani was visiting Ahwaz City's Jondi Shapour (medical faculty) during the Student's Day commemorations when he refused an offer of tap water from the students. According to the Salamat News Agency, he said: "We accept that the water in Khuzestan is very dirty and impure and we have reported the issue to the Ministry of Energy." 

The indigenous Ahwazi Arab population has complained of poor water quality for years, but nothing has been done to improve the situation. At times, the regime has cut drinking water to villages in the region to collectively punish the restive Arab population. 

“I won’t even wash my car with the water in Ahwaz” said a Kuwaiti diplomat in Tehran.  

“The Karun River valley was once inhabited by the Elamite civilization, which rose about 2,700 B.C, is about to be destroyed by the Iranian regime because of their persistent ignorance to it” said sumaiya Faruq, a member of the Ahwazi European Human rights organisation. 

see also:

http://ahwazsolidarity.org/1/post/2009/03/iran-oil-spill-in-the-karkheh-river.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3ix4_NsqI8

http://www.salamatnews.com/viewNews.aspx?ID=13898&cat=9

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bsAZmMmH2JA

http://ahwazsolidarity.org/1/post/2012/05/poverty-and-illiteracy-in-al-ahwaz.html