Drought threatens the future of Iraqs Marsh Arabs

• published: 21 Jul 2015
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Nasiriyah's marshes, Hor al-Hammar, south of Baghdad, April 2nd/3rd 2009 1. Two women walking with their children carrying reeds 2. Wide family carrying reeds 3. Various of canoes on hardened ground 4. Close up cracked ground as a result of drought 5. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Yasser Razaq, Marsh resident ''Our conditions have deteriorated more. I have bought this canoe which you see it now on dried marsh. We asked our schoolchildren to leave schools, because we couldn't afford their expenses and buy them clothes. We don't have money or livestock. Now we don't have fish to sell or farms to cultivate. Our standard of living is deteriorated.'' 6. Stagnant water in dam 9. Pan dam to stagnant water 10. Various of girls in canoe in marsh 11. Various girls reaping reed for feeding livestock 12. Mid girls leaving in canoe 13. Various of women in canoes in marsh 14. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Um Talib, Marsh resident ''Our life is too bad and miserable. We have only some buffaloes. We don't have a salary. We have nothing.'' 15. Various buffalos 16. SOUNDBITE (Arabic) Hussein Ali, Marsh resident ''When Saddam Hussein was in power the marshes were drained. We left for Najaf province. And when Saddam was toppled and water came to marshes, we came back. Then the marshes were drained again (by the drought). What shall we do? The marshes were dry once again.'' 17. Woman carrying pieces of dough and walking towards kiln 18. Close up of pieces of dough of bread on head of woman 19. Various shots of reed being fired in kiln for heating it 20. Woman baking bread 21. Woman bringing bread out of kiln 22. Girl putting bread on her head and walking toward her home 23. Wide of man rowing his canoe in swamp and muddy water 24. Close up of man rowing 25. Close up of man's feet on a canoe making its way through the swamp 26. Tracking shot of swamp 27. Canoe making its way in shallow marsh 28. Various sunset over marshes LEAD IN: A severe drought is threatening Iraq's southern marshes. The land is part of 8,000 square miles of wetlands fed by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and is thought to be the traditional site of the biblical Garden of Eden. The region had just started to recover from Saddam Hussein's punitive draining of its lakes and swamps following the 1991 Gulf War. STORYLINE: Iraq's southern marshes are considered by many as the cradle of Western civilisation. This land in the Hor al-Hammar marsh near Nasiriyah, 200 miles south of Baghdad was drained by Saddam Hussein after the Gulf War to punish the people who depended on it for survival. The marshes were coming back to life a few years ago thanks to help from the United Nations. Now they are once again little more than vast expanses of cracked earth. The area's thousands of inhabitants, known as Marsh Arabs, are victims of the debilitating drought that has ravaged much of Iraq and neighbouring countries over the last two years. ''Our conditions have deteriorated more. I have bought this canoe which you see it now on dried marsh," says fisherman Yasir Razaq. " We asked our schoolchildren to leave schools, because we couldn't afford their expenses and buy them clothes. We don't have money or livestock. Now we don't have fish to sell or farms to cultivate. Our standard of living is deteriorated,'' he says. The Marsh Arab culture has existed for more than 5,000 years in the 8,000 square miles of wetlands fed by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. The flooded, flat plain is said to have played an important role in the development of the agriculture-based culture that helped raise civilisation to new heights. They boasted hundreds of species of birds and fish. Periodic flooding created fertile farm lands. The effect was devastating. You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/youtube/7f8ff48bfe6c0719ab9875dd65d219c5 Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork