For thousands of years, the Ma'dan people have lived 200 miles south of Baghdad in the fertile estuaries where the Tigris and Euphrates rivers meet between the cities of Amara, Nassiriyah, and Basra. Five hundred thousand strong, the Ma'dan are descendants of Sumerians, Babylonians, Persians, and Bedouin who passed through the region. The Ma'dan live by growing rice and dates, raising water buffalo, fishing, and weaving many domestic products from the reeds they live among. Around them, a richly diverse ecosystem—home for fish, migratory birds, pelicans, herons, flamingos—has remained in relative equilibrium for centuries, in spite of being one of the first areas ever to be extensively used by humankind for irrigated agriculture.

Draining the Life

Since the Iran-Iraq and Gulf wars, however, the survival of this part of the Tigris-Euphrates delta—and the Ma'dan—have been under threat from the Iraqi government, which has been diverting the river water and progressively draining the marshlands, causing extensive crop damage, salinization of existing waterways, and the displacement of human and animal life. While attempts to drain or redirect the flow of water into the delta is nothing new—in 1951 the British government's Haigh Report recommended "reclaiming" the marshes through embankments, sluices, and canals—Saddam Hussein's government has systematically tried to disrupt the region by denying food, transportation, and other amenities to the Ma'dan people.

The Ma'dan are Shiite Muslims, and thus close geographically and spiritually to Iran. During the political instability caused by the Iraqi withdrawal from Kuwait and the south in general, Shiite opposition to the Sunni Muslim government of Saddam Hussein used the marshes in particular to launch their guerilla war. In response, the Iraqi government burned villages, poisoned the water, and prohibited movement to and from the marshes. It also stepped up the draining of the marshes. By 1993, two-thirds of the water was kept from reaching the marshlands. The situation for the Ma'dan has become desperate, with many forced to leave their homes to seek safety in Iran and elsewhere.

Much of the attention of the international community after the Gulf War focused on Kurdish separatist activity in the north of the country. Little attention was paid to the plight of the Ma'dan in the south, although in April 1991, the United Nations passed Resolution 688 calling on Iraq "to provide free access to United Nations and non-governmental humanitarian agencies to all parts of the marshes so that essential humanitarian assistance can be provided." Nevertheless, it stopped short of condemning the Iraqi government for its systematic destruction of the delicate habitat of the Tigris-Euphrates delta and its ancient inhabitants. It was only in early 1995 that the European Parliament officially designated the Ma'dan a "persecuted minority" and called the Iraqi government's actions "genocide." That year the U.N. passed a resolution calling for an end to the draining of the marshlands and Iraqi military operations in the area.

All this may have been too late, however. Because Iraq never registered the marshlands under the Ramsar Convention, the international treaty which protects wetlands, international law has been unable to prosecute the government. Furthermore, even though the draining of the marshes has caused damage to surrounding agricultural areas because of pollution through salinization, the Iranians have never protested the draining or displacement of the land or the people who live in it. Seven years after the resolution, the marshlands have been irreversibly damaged and the Ma'dan—who had lived in harmony with their environment for centuries—are homeless and scattered. Current U.N. estimates suggest that the marshes will become non-existent in another 50 years.