Khuzestan’s Water and Electricity Company. The Department of Environment is a governmental
organization responsible for the protection of the environment in the country, which notably
handles the issuance of licenses for industrial, manufacturing and service units 6 as well as the
processing of complaints against, among other grounds, environmental degradation. 7 8 There is
no readily available information indicating the number of complaints received by the mechanism
and whether they have been addressed.
The Khuzestan province is located in southwestern Iran and is predominantly inhabited by ethnic
Arabs.9 In recent years the World Health Organizations has listed Ahvaz, located in Khuzestan
Province, as one of the most polluted city in the world.10 According to a number of specialists
and environmentalists, the high levels of pollution in Khuzestan are linked to the government’s
policies of river diversion, dam constructions and drying marshes for oil exploitation.11 12Added
to the pollution, the U.N. Secretary General (UNSG) has raised concerns about the increasing
impact that the water crisis has had on the right to health in the Islamic Republic of Iran.13 In his
2019 report, the UNSG noted that the Islamic Republic of Iran is among the top five countries
using untreated sewage for the irrigation of agricultural land, which not only destroy
plantations14 but also generates the spread of contagious diseases.15 Untreated wastewater has
been increasingly contaminating drinking water, while less than 40% of Iranians reportedly have
access to proper wastewater treatment facilities.16 The situation is even more acute in the
province of Khuzestan, where there is reportedly only one wastewater treatment facility for the
whole city of Ahvaz (estimated population of 1.3 million) and most of the city’s wastewater is
discharged in the Karoon river, an essential source of water for farming.17 The UNSG noted in
2019 that the inefficiencies in water management in the Islamic Republic of Iran have
6
Department of Environment, Islamic Republic of Iran, https://en.doe.ir/portal/home/?964439/services
Department of Environment, Islamic Republic of Iran https://bit.ly/3afg3Fw
8
Department of Environment, Islamic Republic of Iran https://bit.ly/3jGt9ij
9
Minority Rights Group, https://minorityrights.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Rights-Denied-Violations-against-ethnic-andreligious-minorities-in-Iran.pdf
10
See www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-15109116, and www.who.int/phe/health_topics/outdoorair/database/cities2011/en/ and http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/741891483046725613/pdf/111462-WP-P162048- PUBLICIranEcoMonitor-12-22-2016.pdf
11
Brett, D., ‘Dams: Iran’s weapons of marsh destruction,’ Huffington Post, 13 June 2014 and The Guardian, ‘How
Iran’s Khuzestanwent from wetland to wasteland’, 16 April 2015
12
The Guardian, www.theguardian.com/world/iran-blog/2015/apr/16/iran-khuzestan-environment-wetlandsdustpollutionFieldCodeChanged
13
Report of the Secretary General on the situation of human rights in the Islamic Republic of Iran, February 2019.
https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/G19/028/77/PDF/G1902877.pdf?OpenElement
14
The Guardian, https://www.theguardian.com/world/iran-blog/2015/apr/16/iran-khuzestan-environment-wetlands-dust-pollution
15
Atlantic Council, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-research-reports/issue-brief/environmental-and-wildlifedegradation-in-iran/
16
Atlantic Council, https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-research-reports/issue-brief/environmental-and-wildlifedegradation-in-iran/
17
Eghtesad, https://www.en.eghtesadonline.com/Section-energy-70/32556-poor-wastewater-infrastructure-taking-toll-on-karounriver
7
2